


Thermodynamics and the Modern Male

by Snickfic



Series: I Thought You'd Be Taller [1]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Adolescent Sexuality, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - High School, F/M, Friendship, Gen, Intersexuality, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-10
Updated: 2012-08-10
Packaged: 2017-11-11 20:09:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 23,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/482439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snickfic/pseuds/Snickfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Jared goes into heat for the first time, his comfortable high school slacker existence comes to an abrupt halt. Now he’s an omega, which means alphas smell like heaven (exhibit A: Matt Cohen), terrifying senior Katie Cassidy is saving his damsel ass, and the beta girl he’s been crushing on for months suddenly looks more like a sister. Meanwhile Jensen, beta and best friend extraordinaire, is maybe not dealing well with never having been told that Jared was omega.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Secondary relationships: Jared/Matt Cohen, Jared/OFC  
> Contents/Warnings: alpha/beta/omega dynamics, references to knotting and mpreg, masturbation, sex talk ranging from clinical to juvenile, crude and insensitive language, sexual harassment, bullying, extended discussion of intersex genitalia
> 
> Masterpost for art and fanmix by Verity is [here](http://ladyofthelog.livejournal.com/764604.html).

This is the lunchroom at Ellingsen High: white-washed brick walls, low paneled ceilings, lines in the style of 60s modern that hasn’t been modern for years, a warm rich aroma of congealing mac ‘n’ cheese. Smack in the center of the room, large and loud, are the alphas. Most of them play sports, and play them hard; only ten betas played varsity football team this year, most consigned forever to second string. The school’s only twenty percent alpha, which is low, but they make up for it in sheer presence.

Loosely distributed around the alpha tables, not too far but not too near, are the omegas. They’re not as segregated as the alpha tables; beta girls sit there sometimes, too. A current of tension runs between alpha tables and omega, always, a magnetic thrill of attraction/repulsion that even the betas and the unprimed can sense, though their noses are blind to the source.

The betas are everywhere else. Guy tables, girl tables, mixed: they’re scattered around and among the prime tables. Beta tables are relaxed, comfortable tables. What magnetism betas have is with each other, and it’s weak at best. That’s not the reason Jared’s never quite let on that he isn’t beta, but it is a perk.

Today is Wednesday, which means potato wedges and the sex column. Jared’s stocked his tray with the former, four paper boats full. As he threads his way through the tables, he sees a few people semi-covertly reading the sex column in _The Underground_ , the illicit one-sheet zine that only occasionally gets confiscated by the administration.

As soon as Jared sits down at his friends’ usual table, Doerflinger plops down in a chair across from him with a smirk and flashes another copy of the zine.

“Dude, you hungry?” Jensen asks, sliding in next to Jared. Jensen has two boats of salty fried goodness himself, but he also has a depressed-looking packaged salad, because somehow Jensen figures that will balance out the saturated fats. 

“Growing,” Jared says around a potato wedge.

“You’re already past optimum height. You’re just going to get more overgrown from here on out.” Jensen’s scowling, but not very hard. It takes a lot to make Jensen lose his cool; apathy in the face of annoyances is one of his defining qualities. Unfortunately for his teachers, he considers school an annoyance. They sigh over him a lot.

“Aw, I’m sure you’ve got another inch or two in there,” Jared says, reaching up to pat Jensen on the head, which earns him a swat and a casual “Screw you.”

Brody and Travis make their way to the table and sit. They’re Jared’s fellow slacker distance geeks, guys that like running but not enough to get too worked up about it. Jared can respect that. Doerflinger’s another story. He doesn’t run, parties more than the rest of them combined, and wins the Underachiever Award by a mile; the story goes that he attached himself to Travis and Brody back in second grade and is still around because finding new friends would be too much work. 

Brody, Travis, Doerflinger, Jensen: these are, for better or worse, Jared’s people.

Doerflinger clears his throat and shakes the page meaningfully. “ _Dear Miz Sassy Ass,_ “ he begins. “ _I primed as an omega a year ago_ —’” 

“Oh, God,” says Travis. “Here comes the drama. Freakin’ omegas, they’re even worse than the rest of the girls.”

“C’mon, we just got through with Heat Week,” Jensen says. “Like we’re going to hear about anything else.”

Heat Week: a week off school twice a year when the omegas get together for orgies – so the locker room wisdom holds – and everyone else gets a vacation. All the talk this week has been about which omegas managed to sneak away from their parents and their orgies and get knotted by an alpha instead.

Alpha/omega sex, they say, is even better than an orgy.

“Shut up,” says Brody amiably. “Let the man read his sex column.”

“ _Dear Miz Sassy Ass_ ,” Doerflinger repeats. “ _I primed as an omega a year ago, but I’ve never let my alpha boyfriend knot me because I’m scared of imprinting._ “

“ _That’s_ why they’re worse,” Travis says. “Give ‘em knot once and they follow you forever.”

Jensen snorts. “Which you’d know how?”

“C’mon, Jensen,” Jared says. “Don’t you remember Alpha Cousin Ron? The dudeliest alpha to ever dude?”

The table groans collectively. Nobody’d been sorry when Ron had transferred out six months after he transferred in. Except maybe Travis. He liked the reflected attention. “My cousin’s a hell of a lot dudelier than you,” he says.

“Not like that’s hard,” Doerflinger snickers. Jared flips him off.

“We’re all betas here, man,” Jensen says. “Middle management and star field goal kickers, those are our lots in life. Lost Causes ‘R’ Us. So let Dorkflinger get to the sex already.”

Doerflinger continues, “ _My alpha boyfriend says it doesn’t count as sex if there’s no knot._ “

“Fucker,” says Brody.

“We are so screwed,” Jensen says.

“Yeah, but our girlfriends aren’t,” Jared says. “Apparently.” Not that Jared’s ever had one, not really, but he’s working on that.

The table snickers appreciatively.

“ _I really want to be close to him,_ “ continues Doerflinger, “ _but I don’t know if I’m ready for forever yet. What should I do? Signed, Insecure and Untied._ “

“So what’s Sassy Ass say?” Jared asks.

“ _Dear Insecure, First, go tell your asshole alpha that if knot’s so important, he can go get some himself._ “

“Oh, _yeah_ ,” Jensen says.

“ _Second, don’t ever let anyone have sex you don’t want. Tell ‘em I said so._ “

“I keep telling you,” Travis says. “Sassy Ass has got to be an omega. Only reason she’d keep harping on this stuff.”

Jared tunes out. Travis is pretty much a douche about omegas. If Jared were a different guy, he might suppose Travis was compensating, that he harbored a secret terror of priming into one someday, unannounced.

Sassy Ass gives the omega what-for, calls imprinting a filthy lie, and finishes off with the inspirational message that your second knot isn’t less than your first knot, just different. It’s classic Sassy Ass: rude, crude, and radical.

Two letters later – one from a beta who’s shy on an omega and feeling inadequate, another from an omega trying to disentangle herself from a clingy heat buddy – Jared announces, “Time for dessert.” He gets up and heads for the cafeteria door. 

When he gets to the vending machine out in the hall, Trina Mathers is there, all big dark eyes and corkscrew curls. Possibly she was part of his plan.

“Hi,” he says, very smooth.

She smiles shyly. “Hi, Jared. How’s track?”

“Pretty good. We have a meet on Friday.” Every exchange he has with Trina, Jared feels them inching closer to the moment when he gets up the guts to ask her out.

“How’s the play coming?” he says. Trina’s really into drama, which Jared thinks is especially cool given how shy she is when she’s actually talking to people.

“Pretty good,” she says. “The sets are kind of a lot.”

“Not done yet?”

She shrugs ruefully. “It’s going to be a busy couple of weeks.”

Also she’s pretty much the cutest beta girl in the entire school. Jared has a scientific survey to prove it, participants consisting of himself, Doerflinger (who disagreed, forcing Jared to throw out his data on account of bias), and Jensen (who’s still smarting over the break-up with Lanie, and therefore opinion-free). 

Any day now, Jared’s going to ask her out.

They wave only slightly-awkward goodbyes, and Jared takes his booty back to the cafeteria. When he lays it on the table, Jensen lifts an eyebrow. “Seriously, man?”

Jared looks down at his four packs of knock-off Twinkies and two Snickers bars. “What?”

“You’d think _you_ were going into heat or something,” Doerflinger says. Jensen laughs.

Jared freezes.

“You don’t mind?” Jensen says, snagging a cake package. “Since you’re so well stocked.”

“Sure” Jared says. He fumbles for a Snickers bar and somehow gets it open without his fingers making any connections with his brain, which is just as well, since his brain isn’t really functioning. At all.

“Jared?” He registers that Jensen’s eyeing him. “You okay, man?”

“Yeah,” Jared says.

He’s not.

He doesn’t have any of the other symptoms, does he?

Nope. Definitely not. He isn’t horny, really at all; he didn’t even wish he could sneak Trina off to a broom closet the way he normally does anytime she’s in sight. Okay, he’s a little overheated, the collar of his shirt’s a little itchy, but it’s left over from P.E.. Has to be. He doesn’t stink. He could tell if he stunk, right? Jensen, Doerflinger, Brody – they’d totally razz him if he stank.

Scratch that. They’re all betas; what’re the chances they’d even notice?

He’s not going into heat. Yes, he’s gotten the speech from his mom every year since eighth grade, yes, he knows about traumatic first heats, about going home and sweating them out away from... everyone. 

But not today. Someday (please God no) he’ll go into heat, but not today.

“Dude, Jared.” Jensen’s waving his hand in front of Jared’s face. “Bell’s gonna ring.” 

The bell rings. (Jensen has a gift for knowing this; it’s generally acknowledged.)

Jared pushes shakily to his feet. His Snickers and would-be Twinkies are gone; he’s honestly not sure whether he ate them or Jensen did.

He’s not going into heat.

\--

Jared is so very much going into heat.

It’s history, fifth period, and cherubic white-haired Mrs. Bekken is pointing out the really boring intricacies of the Federalist ideology versus that of the Democratic-Republicans (and isn’t that some kind of oxymoron?). Meanwhile Jared’s gripping his desk so hard that he’s pressing a wood grain pattern into his fingertips, which is doing a crap job of easing either the fidgets _or_ the shaking.

He’s sweating, and it still smells pretty much like sweat to him, but two desks ahead of him, jerkass alpha Brock Kelly keeps taking quick sharp sniffs. The omega to Jared’s left – Lindsey? – is giving him looks. Itching, that’s just a metaphor, that’s nothing like this combination of too-tight and chafing, like a molting snake must feel, like the old skin’s hanging on too long but the new skin’s still stretched across too much flesh.And horny? Fuck, yes. He’s trying damn hard not to breathe, because when he does, all the stinks of the world slam him in the nose, and half of them are making him throb in parts south that have never throbbed before.

He barely notices when Mrs. Bekken stops lecturing. When she walks to his desk and pauses, he realizes that there’s an assignment written on the board and that most people have their heads bowed, scribbling away – the people who aren’t glancing sideways at _him_. Mrs. Bekken places a folded slip of white paper on his desk. “Take this to the main office, would you, Jared?”

He stares up at her, wondering if he looks as crazed as he feels, if this is some sort of punishment, or whether the crazy is all on the inside and The Bekken has just chosen today of all days to grace him with this favor – which, on any other day, _would_ be a favor.

She’s still waiting for him to answer, and from somewhere behind him he hears a snicker.

“Yeah, sure,” he says. He takes the note and gets to his feet. His palms are sweaty, he notices. He hopes the office doesn’t mind if the note arrives a little damp.

It is not, he realizes on his way, the only thing that’s a little damp. He keeps going and tries to ignore the slippery feeling behind his balls.

At the front counter, the secretary opens the note, gives Jared a crown-to-toes look-over, and then hands it to him. 

_He’s in heat_ , the note says. _Send him to the nurse._

The burning he’s feeling in his face right now? It has nothing to do with his heat. 

He walks down to the nurse’s office next. She takes one sniff and nods as if she knows all there could possibly be to know. She quizzes him on his symptoms and then, with what Jared supposes must be long-practiced gentleness, she asks him if he realizes what’s happening to him.

“I’m in heat,” he says. 

“Were you aware this could happen?” she asks, still infinitely gentle.

“You mean, am I the poor would-be alpha just waiting to pop his knot?”

She shrugs, unconcerned by his language. He supposes she gets a lot of that, dealing with this kind of thing. He’s a little bit ashamed. “I knew,” he says.

“If you’d like, I can send you over to the public heat clinic to ride things out.”

“God, no.” Just sitting in this office with her is bad enough; going through an entire heat among strangers sounds like hell.

“All right. Can you go home now? Is there someone who can pick you up?”

He can’t remember. He can’t think at all.

“Do your parents work?” she suggests.

The question shakes something loose. “My mom,” he manages to say. “It’s her day off.”

She nods and turns to her computer. In a moment she’s dialing the phone, and the next she’s asking if he wants to talk to his mom. He thinks she might have asked him twice. He takes the phone.

“Jared?”

“Mom?” he says. It might be more of a croak.

She’s coming, she says. She’ll be right there. 

Jared hands the phone back to the nurse, and she waves him over to a row of chairs just inside the main office. It’s where the less belligerent students wait when they’re called to the vice-principal’s office. There is, thank God, no one there now but Jared. 

A thought occurs to him while he waits: Mrs. Bekken is an omega. Jared knew she was; he just never thought about it before. Mrs. Bekken could smell his heat. Jared groans. The secretary glances over, looking sympathetic. Jared doesn’t explain.

Just after the next bell rings, Jared’s mom shows up. “Oh, honey,” she says. “You should have stayed home today. I should have known.”

He’s gladder to see her than he feels like admitting. “Can we just go?”

His mom signs him out with the secretary, and they head out. 

On second thought, maybe they should have waited. It’s not far from the front office to the car, but they have to shoulder their way through the usual between-classes crush. He’s a getting a lot of glares and wrinkled noses and more than a couple of leers, and one time he runs into the back of someone and just about groans at the pressure of their backpack on his belly, which is weirdly tender.

He and his mom are finally almost out the door, almost to freedom and home and a slow agonizing death of heat and humiliation, when he hears someone yelling his name. He turns and sees Jensen staring at him, _What the fuck?_ written across his face as plain as day.

Jared ducks his head and keeps going.

\--

Home looks and feels the same, and it’s only as the thought occurs to Jared that he realizes he was worried it might not. He stumbles over Emily’s sneakers in the entryway and slams his palm against the wall in frustration – which, okay, is maybe a bit of a hormone-fueled overreaction - but once he’s got his balance again, he relishes that spike of annoyance, because as long as he’s pissed off at an absent little sister, he can’t be... Well.

Terrified.

“Jared?” His mom’s running her hand up and down his arm. “How’re you feeling, honey?”

He shrugs away from her. “I don’t know,” he mumbles, because like hell is he going to tell his mom that the two things he wants most in the world right now are to jack off and jump straight out of his skin. Possibly at the same time. Although the jacking off might be a problem; his blood’s definitely hot for something, but he’s not hard, and he doesn’t even want to think about what that means.

She holds a hand to his forehead and then nods thoughtfully at her damp palm. “Come on,” she says, nodding towards the kitchen. “I think we need to talk.”

That sounds like an awful idea. “Mom, I don’t...” Jared goes for pitiful, hunching his shoulders and peering out from under his hair. 

Melanie Padalecki lifts her eyebrows and looks pointedly from Jared to the doorway. Jared goes. Once they’re in the kitchen, she sits him down at the kitchen table and sets a glass of water in front of him.

“I’m not thirsty,” he says.

“You will be,” she says. “ _After_ you’re already dehydrated. Bottoms up.”

He makes a face, but she is implacable. This is his mom in a mood; he isn’t sure what kind yet. Not even the feeling like ants tip-toeing across his skin is enough to make him disobey. He gulps down a few swallows.

“Jared, honey, I’m sorry,” she says, sitting down across from him. Jared blinks. “I swear you’ve eaten half your weight in the last three days and all I could think was, ‘oh, he’s going through another growth spurt.’”

“Mom,” he says, shifting in his seat. “It’s not your fault.”

“No,” she nodded and took a breath. “Partly it’s yours.”

“What?” His voice cracks with injured rage.

“Every year since you were twelve, we have sat you down, we’ve tried to talk you through the signs, the symptoms, what you could expect, and what did you always say?” She looks him in the eye until he ducks behind his bangs. “‘Just give me a book.’ And we did.”

Jared doesn’t say anything. 

“You know why we did, right? Why we didn’t make you listen to us?”

“Yeah.” He doesn’t really; his parents have been skirting the fact of him being omega for years, and it’s suited him just fine.

His mom must have seen through his lie. “Because of what happened before we moved here,” she prompts.

“Right,” Jared says hurriedly. There’s badness lurking there, in his memories of school before fifth grade. It’s the monster under his bed.

He’s made it a practice never, ever to look.

“But did you ever read any of those books, Jared? Did you so much as crack one open?”

Now he’s hunching for real. He doesn’t want to talk about this. Ever. “Yeah,” he mumbles. “A couple of times.” In one of them he’d gotten as far as the intro, counting the blessings of omegahood, before he’d slammed it shut. Another one – less creepy in theory, not so much about the joys of reproduction and seasons and cycles – had a photo gallery of bitch boys, some more clothed than others, one pregnant, and after flipping through the first couple of pages he closed the book gently and breathed until the nausea was past.

Jared startles at a touch to his hand. His mom curls her fingers into his and squeezes. “Jared?” she says.

“Yeah,” he says.

“It’s going to suck.” He jerks up to look at her. She smiles wryly at him and keeps hold of his hand. “First heats always suck.”

“I know,” he says. “I took the class. In school.”

She nods sagely, like she knows exactly how much of sex ed he spent drawing dirty pictures in the textbook margins versus how much of the class he spent, you know, learning stuff. For example, what to watch for so he didn’t go into heat at school.

“Finish your water,” his mom says, rising. “I’ll be right back.”

Jared empties the glass and sets it rattling on the table. With his mom gone, all the sensations he’s been managing to ignore are back and in force, and it’s all he can do just to stay seated. A few times before in school he’s seen a girl this way, someone too stupid to read her body’s signals and stay home like a smart omega. Some people laughed. Doerflinger laughed, because Doerflinger is an ass, and Jared laughed with him, because as long as he did he could pretend that it would never happen to him. Which makes him an ass, too, obviously. 

“If I’d been paying attention, this wouldn’t’ve been happened,” Jared’s mother says. She sets a plastic Tupperware tub on the table in front of him, and long before his brain has caught up to his eyes, he’s prying the lid open and pulling out a couple of tubes, the kind lotion comes in. He doesn’t even process what their labels say, because he’s taking something else from the tub, something still new with a tag hanging off it. The thing is long and skinny with a soft inflating knob on the end, and—

He drops it like the poisonous snake it is. His face is so hot, it’s going to melt off any minute now, Raiders-style. “ _Mom_ ,” he says. 

“Sweetie,” she says, “you have three options. I explain how you use the dildo—”

His mom isn’t allowed to even _know_ that word.

“—since I know my way around the geography.”

Oh God.

“Or you wait until your father gets home, and he can do the man-to-man thing.”

That sounds... better?

“Or we can call your cousin.”

“Dad,” Jared rasps out immediately, because that’s got to be better than sex instruction over the phone from _Chad Lindberg_ , even if he does happen to be the other male omega in Jared’s generation. Anything’s better than Lindy.

\--

Jared waits, sometimes in the bathroom, sometimes on his bed, sitting – huddling – _writhing_ , okay, that’s what he’s doing. He figures it’d be sexy if he were the needy damsel in the jungle of some porny Tarzan rip-off. In Jared’s reality, though, writhing just means he’s sweaty and feverish and kind of achy down low and that no trick he’s ever used to get off is even making a dent.

Because, here’s the thing: Jared’s dick? Is pretty much irrelevant right now. His body does not care about his dick. Jared might be a little bit terrified by that.

He’s also still miserable. He tries messing around with the fake knot, but despite the slippery grossness that is his mangina right now, there’s still chafing and pinching, and he thinks maybe he’s getting the angle wrong. If he is, it’s probably because the feeling of sticking something _inside himself_ makes him a little nauseous. Also, just holding the thing makes him blush furnace-hot, which does not improve anything.

This is what it is to be knot hungry, he thinks, this aching bottomless need. When someone hisses _knot slut_ at an omega, this is what they mean.

It occurs to him in the middle of his desperation-tinged haze that his trusty internet could maybe help him out here. He has no doubt that the internet, font of all knowledge, can tell him more than he ever, _ever_ wanted to know about entering into a more intimate relationship with his dildo. Which is what stops him, pretty much.

He probably should have figured all of this out at some point, right? 

Eventually he just stops trying to think at all. Whenever the sweat starts rolling into his eyes, he goes for a shower, and then he clumps back to his room and curls up on his bed and shivers. If not all the salt water in his eyes is sweat, well, he’s hormonal as hell; that’ll have to do for an excuse.

\--

“Jared?” His door opens. Jared feels the bed dip as his mom sits and runs her hand across his forehead. She disappears again and comes back with a wet cloth that she wipes his face with. She makes him drink another glass of water, and then she sits with him on the bed and lets him curl up next to her with his head in her lap.

Jared lies there for a while. Eventually his neck and shoulder start to ache, not to mention various other parts of him that were aching already.

“Dad won’t be home for another hour,” his mom says. “Are you sure you don’t want to talk to your cousin?”

“Yeah, okay,” he croaks. At this point, he’ll try anything. 

The conversation with cousin Lindberg is exactly as humiliating as Jared expects it to be. Lindy laughs and chivvies him along and tells five filthier jokes in twenty minutes than Jared has heard in his whole life put together. Lindy grumbles that a live walk-through is a thousand times better than just a bunch of directions — “Dude, it’s not incest, it’s an omega thing. Serious.” — but Jared absolutely positively refuses phone sex, and Lindy eventually breaks down and tells him what to do. After they hang up, Jared lies down on his bed and fumbles his way to his first full-on omega-style orgasm.

It’s not that hot, really. His body is, for the moment, no longer at the brink of meltdown, but the _something inside him_ aspect still makes his skin crawl, and anyway he can do better with his dick – when his dick is in season, which is apparently all the time except now. Cousin Lindy assured him that it’d be feeling much perkier once his heat was over, for which Jared is more grateful than he can say. Or wants to say. 

Now that his brain is marginally less scrambled, he remembers how much he does not want to talk about any of this ever in his entire life. He has maybe a week to get over that small hurdle before he has to face, say, Jensen. And also the rest of the world.

\--

Jensen calls on day three.

Jared’s kind of got the hang of things now. He’s getting better with the knot, to the point that possibly not every single aspect of being heat is the worst thing he’s ever experienced in his life. Close, but not quite. He’s figured out how long he can go without using it – time spent eating, pretending to do homework, and, God, _laundry_ , because now that he’s not on the edge of desperation every minute, he can tell just how much he reeks. (His mom is a saint, he has decided, for cuddling him that first night.) Every few hours, he takes a time-out for his scheduled sex and shower, and the cycle starts over again.

After his third iteration of the day, he’s feeling pretty okay. His body’s moderately satisfied, and for school he’s reading _Macbeth_ , which is violent enough to keep him interested – apparently he gets bloodthirstier on his heat, which would disturb him if he let himself think about it. 

Those two facts, distraction and relative comfort, are all the excuse he has for answering the phone without even checking the caller ID.

“Jared?” Jensen says his name uncertainly.

“Oh God.” Jared scrubs at his face and searches for conversation. Unfortunately, words are not Jared’s friend. He hasn’t got any.

“Are you... How are you?”

_I’m cranky, my dick’s on the fritz, and I have to stick a knot up my man-hole every three hours._

“I’m making it,” Jared says.

“I saw your mom yesterday,” Jensen says. “At the office. I think she was picking up assignments for you.”

“Great,” Jared says. “I was almost out of homework.” The joke is flat. He cringes.

“Bored out of your mind?” Jensen says.

“Oh, God,” Jared says. It’s only partially true – he’s more spacey than bored, in a feverish, fidgety way that he can’t do anything about. However, he’s going to cling to this normal, _boring_ conversation for all it’s worth.

“When are you coming back to school?”

It’s Saturday now. “Monday, I think? Or maybe Tuesday.” It depends on when his body decides to let him be human again.

There’s a pause. “You wanna watch a movie? I could come over.” 

Jared’s warmed by a rush of gratitude and panic in equal measures. “You don’t have to do that, man,” he says. “I’m gross, and...” Just gross, mostly. Talking to his very normal beta friend, Jared is reminded in how many different ways he is gross.

“Yeah, but your parents’ widescreen is bigger than ours,” Jensen says.

The sentiment is so mundane, so comforting, that before Jared can stop himself, he says, “Yeah, okay.” 

About five times after Jensen hangs up, Jared almost calls his cell and tells him to forget it. He doesn’t.

A few minutes later, Jensen bangs on the front door. “You still got the munchies?” Jensen asks. He’s holding Cheetos in one hand and a sack of early Easter candy in the other. Jared wants, in the most platonic possible way, to kiss him. Jared’s mom actually has him on a special high-calorie heat diet so he doesn’t come out skeletal on the other side, but he’s not saying no to some junk food, too. 

“We’ve got soda,” he says, and leads the way to the kitchen. 

“Look,” he says a few minutes later as they settle in on the sofa. “I might have to take a break in the middle. For, um, stuff.” He ducks his head to hide the awful blushing.

Jensen shrugs. “Sure.”

That was easier than Jared expected. Okay, then.

They end up watching _Thermopylae_ for the umpteenth time while washing Cheeto dust down with Coke. 

“God, only _alphas_...” Jensen begins, the start of a joke he’s made every time they’ve watched this movie, but the joke trails off into silence. Jared forces down his mouthful of Cheeto and twists open another candy. 

About halfway through, Jared starts to feel a little flushed. He refills his soda and ignores the feeling. Ten minutes later, he’s trying hard to sit still, because he knows from experience that squirming doesn’t do anything for the now-familiar throbbing behind his balls. 

Also, this movie sucks. Every single one of his and Jensen’s ‘douchebag alpha’ lines is strained, because every time either of them says, ‘alpha,’ Jared thinks, _omega_.

He’s trying not to breathe, either, because he knows what he’s going smell if he does: himself. In heat. And yeah, his sense of smell is mucho improved – not that ‘improved’ is the word he’d use just now – but at the moment he’s pretty sure anyone with a nose can smell him.

The movies pauses. Jared glances over as Jensen turns on a light. Jensen stares back at him, and finally says, “Man, you reek—”

This was such a stupid idea, letting Jensen come over. Ever talking to Jensen again was a stupid idea.

“—and I want to raid your fridge. Is twenty minutes enough?”

Jared stares back. Finally, he musters words. “Thirty would be better.” 

Jensen makes no comment on Jared’s flaming blush. “Okay,” he says.

It’s the fake knotting that takes time. Thirty minutes is pushing it. Still, Jared is back on the couch twenty-eight minutes later, damp but clear-headed. Jensen walks in with a sandwich on a plate and sinks in next to him. 

The movie stays paused, and the lights stay on. Jared stares at the floor. It beats the alternatives. A while after Jensen takes his first bit of sandwich, the rest of it’s still sitting on his plate. Jared can just see it out the corner of his eye.

“I ask you something?” Jensen asks.

Here it comes. “I guess.”

“Did you know?”

There is no question in Jared’s mind what Jensen’s asking. Everyone’s heard of male omegas who didn’t know what they were until their first heat, but anatomically, there’s never been any doubt about Jared. Not that he’s going to explain that to Jensen. “I knew.” Then, because that seems lacking, he adds, “It runs in my family.” 

“Guess we should lay off the bitch jokes now.”

Jared shrugs. Or possibly just hunches. “If you want.”

“Dude, I wish you’d told me. I would’ve—”

Jared gets to his feet, because he just cannot deal with this conversation sitting down.”Been weirded out? Spent the last four years avoiding the bitch boy?”

“What the hell do you think I care?” The volume of Jensen’s voice does not suggest uncaring.

“ _I_ care!”

Jensen looks at him.

“I fucking hate this, Jensen! I can’t even describe to you all the kinds of disgusting I feel, and I go pretty much insane every three hours until I stick a damned knot up my boy pussy—” Okay, apparently he is going to tell Jensen about that. “—and when I go to school in two days, three fourths of the school is going to feel sorry for and/or laugh at me, and the last fourth’ll be sniffing me up.”

Jared sinks down into the sofa and covers his face in his hands. He doesn’t want to look at Jensen anymore. He doesn’t want to look at _anything_ anymore. 

It’s quiet for a while. Finally, Jensen says, “That sucks, man.”

Jared’s huff of laughter might be a little bitter. “You’re telling me.” His eyes, when he lifts his head to look at Jensen, might be a little damp. “You can tell me if it’s too weird. I’ll let you off the hook.”

“What, the best friend hook?” Jensen asks. He’s staring off somewhere in the middle distance, but he swings around to smirk at Jared. A little thinly, maybe, but the smirk is there. “It’s about Goddamn time. I’ve been trying to wriggle my way off that one for years.”

Jared punches him in the shoulder, just like old times.


	2. Chapter 2

Jared’s Monday prediction was a bit optimistic, it turns out. He spends the day sweating and shivering through heat withdrawals, which his mom promises will get easier with time. For now, however, they suck.

Tuesday, then: the day of Jared’s triumphant return. Yeah, right.

Tuesday morning is like Jared’s first day in town all over again, nerves and twisting stomach included. After his mom drops him off, he spends a few moments sidled against a tree trunk, just staring at the building and scenting every single person who walks past.

It was one thing to come downstairs for dinner on Sunday night and notice the sweet sharpness of his mom’s scent and the pre-omega blandness of Emily’s, the difference between Wallace’s clean little-boy smell and his dad’s sturdy alphaness. It was hardly conscious, the sorting between adult and not adult, male and female, alpha and omega and pre-, because they’re all just family first and those other things second.

This, though, this is something else. Everyone _smells_. _Everyone_ does. It’s like seeing in color for the first time, like he’s lived in his whole life in black-and-white Kansas and has now been hurled, flailing and thrashing, into Oz. Sheena from the track team is an omega; somehow Jared never knew that before. Brock Kelly loiters near the door with his minions, his alpha odor is a little stronger than the others’, which shocks Jared not because it doesn’t make sense, but because he never noticed until now. The betas don’t smell much different from last week; Jared could probably tell guy from girl with his eyes closed now, but beyond that they’re still just B.O. and perfume and deodorant. They don’t have any of the pungence of alphas and omegas. It’s the difference between water and vinegar. Betas smell sort of restful, he thinks.

Jared takes a deep breath – coughing, because he is just not used to the information overload a deep breath yields – and heads for algebra class.

It’s worse inside. Jared keeps his head down, breathes shallowly, and pretends to himself that the tittering and stares and conversational asides he keeps almost catching have nothing to do with him, the newest omega in town. Probably some of them really don’t. At least one or two. Right? 

Classes are impossible. He learns nothing. The only good thing is that Mr. Spinoza’s talking health and nutrition in gym again, thank God. It’s boring as hell – again, Jared learns nothing – but at least there’s no immediate physical contact with alphas. 

There’s more to alphas than just pungent reek, Jared’s realizing. In some of their scents, there’s a clean bitterness like crushed pine, a teasing sharpness like a jalapeño aftertaste. It’s not awful. Jared catches himself sniffing for it once or twice, and vows, appalled, to hold his breath from there on out.

Close contact with alphas: absolutely not happening.

When the bell rings in English class for lunch, Jared doesn’t even bother with the cafeteria line. He makes a beeline for his usual table, slumps into a chair, and drops his head on his folded arms. That way, he doesn’t have to see anybody or smell anything much but his own skin or think about how he has to come back tomorrow and do all this again.

“How’s things?”

Jared lifts his head and looks up, blinking against the throbbing in his sinuses. The headache’s a product of way too many smells in way too small a space. He finds Jensen eyeing him cautiously. “Hey,” Jared ventures. He doesn’t shrug, because that would be painful. “Things are things. You know.”

Jensen looks around. Jared does, too, and realizes that though it’s been a few minutes and the lunch lady line’s down to almost nothing, he and Jensen are the only ones at their table. Maybe he should get something. He doesn’t feel hungry, exactly, but he’s getting a little light-headed.

Jensen gets settled and unwraps a limp, damp-looking sandwich that does nothing for Jared’s appetite. “So, Rogstad puked in the locker room yesterday,” Jensen says conversationally. “After P.E.”

Jared snorts and then regrets it. Ugh, sinuses. “Man, sorry I missed that.”

“Guy had fruit loops for breakfast. It was a work of art.”

Jared rolls his eyes. Okay, that hurts, too. Jared pinches the bridge of his nose. “Dude, this sucks.”

Jensen pauses mid-chew. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. The smells, man. Like, _everyone_.” Jared waves his hand vaguely around the lunchroom. As he does, he spots Travis and Brody headed in his direction, sporting trays. Maybe they were just running late. Maybe they weren’t avoiding him like a heat-borne plague at all.

When they get to the table, they both look him over like Jensen did. After a moment, they sit down. “Hey, Jared,” Brody says.

“Hey.”

“High jump, man,” Travis says. “Danner from Minnehaha schooled us.”

Right. Track meet, previous Friday, which Jared forgot all about. He winces. “Sorry.”

Brody looks somewhere else. “Not your fault.”

From somewhere behind them, Doerflinger calls, “Hey, bitch boy!” 

“Oh my God,” Jensen says, scowling.

Jared’s frozen, flushing, rooted to his seat. He can’t even close his eyes. All he can do is stare at the back of some girl’s head on the other side of the room.

Doerflinger drops into the chair next to him and leans into Jared’s space. “Heard you went pussy,” he says. “Was it awesome?”

Jared can’t breathe, much less form words.

“Not cool, Doerflinger,” Jensen says.

He knew it: the glances, the less-than-subtle sniffs, they were for him. 

“Dude. Guy goes hot for knot? That’s news. There’s only, what, five of you in the school?”

He thought he got more body contact than usual in the hall today, hands brushing past with unwelcome familiarity, shoulders shoving with new force. Nobody said anything to him outright, but clearly everybody knew, even the betas, who had to be told: _omega_.

“Lay off,” Jensen says.

Jared turns on him, his jaw tight with panic. “Dude, shut up.” That’s all he needs – a beta saving his poor little feelings. “If I’ve got a problem, I’ll handle it.”

It’s a filthy lie. In the past, ‘handling it’ has included such strategies as staying home sick – genuinely, pukingly, miserably sick – and moving to another state. Not that Jared ever thinks about that.

Jensen buys it, though. He’s still scowling – at Jared or Doerflinger or his avocado-and-tuna, who knows which. “Yeah, whatever.”

There’s another long pause, Doerflinger chewing thoughtfully on his sandwich, Jensen biting viciously into his. Jared dares hope that maybe the moment is past.

“Damn,” Travis says. “You finish that thing from algebra?”

He and Brody exchange glances. Brody pauses a fraction of a second too long before he groans. “Think Donna will let us copy?”

“Better go catch her now.”

“Yeah.” They rise, one after the other. “Catch you guys later,” Brody says.

“Right,” Jensen says, disbelieving.

Like the conversation never paused, Doerflinger says, “So you do have a pussy, right? ‘Cause I call it a rip-off if you don’t even get a pussy.”

Jared tries. He does. He works to formulate words – to deal with the fact that Doerflinger doesn’t look so much malicious as just _interested_ \- but after a few seconds of gaping he gives up and pushes to his feet. “I’m gonna get something from the vending machine,” he says, and he walks away, all the way out of the cafeteria. Once he gets to the machine in the hall, he stands there, staring blindly.

This is exactly as bad as he thought it would be. Travis and Brody are definitely grossed out and being asses about it. The only reason Doerflinger isn’t may be because he thinks it’s a little hot, which grosses Jared out. Meanwhile, Jensen’s trying to play alpha protector, and that is wrong on so many different levels Jared doesn’t know where to start.

“You gonna pick something?” 

Startled, Jared turns to see a girl eyeing him narrowly. Blonde, face vaguely familiar. Senior, Jared thinks. Omega, says his nose. 

“Go ahead,” he says, stepping aside.

A male voice calls from behind them. “You standing guard over the noob, Cassidy?”

This is what Jared needs to complete his day. Brock Kelly is what Jared needs.

“Like this kid couldn’t punch your lights out,” says the girl. Cassidy. Right, _Katie_ Cassidy. She ran track his freshman year before she screwed up her knee on a javelin throw. Jared remembers her as mildly terrifying.

“Whatever,” Brock says. He saunters up to Jared, just six inches too deep into Jared’s air, and sniffs theatrically. “Mm _mm_. He’s all perfume. I like it.”

Jared’s eyes are crossing a little, looking Brock in the eye. He hasn’t been this close to an alpha – his dad excepted – since _before_. 

“I don’t have a date to prom yet,” Brock says. 

Jared hates Brock. He has always hated Brock, because Brock is a user and a tool. 

“You wanna go with me, baby?”

Still, underneath the aftershave and the leather, he smells kind of awesome. 

“You wanna grace my arm?”

Jared kind of wants to kiss him.

“Ow!” Brock yelps. Jared startles backward. Brock is rubbing at his leg. “Bitch!”

“Leave,” Katie says. Jared had forgotten she was there.

Brock scowls at her a minute, and then he glances at Jared again and gives him a filthy smirk. “Prom. Think about it.”

Jared turns on Katie. “I don’t need saving!”

“Guy’s an ass,” she says. “There’s lots of alphas out there. Do better.” 

“I don’t want an alpha. I don’t even like guys!”

She eyes him skeptically and then shrugs. “Your story.” She shoves a hand into her jeans pocket and pulls out a slip of paper. She hands it to him. _Omega Alliance,_ it reads. A classroom is listed underneath. “Thursdays at lunch,” Katie says. “In case you’re interested.”

“Yeah, no thanks.” 

She shrugs again and walks off, apparently unconcerned. Jared snorts and absently stuffs the slip of paper in his pocket. Omega bonding: a thing he so very much does not need.

Food. He wanted food.

He’s about decided on the bag of peanuts – at least they have nutritional value – when it finally dawns on him: he wanted to kiss Brock Kelly. “Oh my God,” he says. He’s over it now, though. Now he’s nauseous. 

He’s not thinking about this. There is no _this_ to think about.

Jared doesn’t go back to the cafeteria. He goes to his locker and tries to look inconspicuous while he waits for the bell. Jensen finds him a few minutes later. “Okay, first, Brody and Travis are douches,” Jensen says. “And second, Doerflinger’s a freaking idiot.”

Jared searches his locker for something that needs his attention. “Well, yeah.” 

“I told him if he called you ‘bitch boy’ again, I’d break his face.”

Jared blinks and turns around. “You did?” The idea of Jensen breaking Doerflinger’s face is a little bit funny. While Jensen isn’t small, he’s not exactly meaty, either, whereas describing Doerflinger as meaty would be diplomatic. “Um. Thanks, I guess.”

“Damn straight,” Jensen says. 

“I can fight my own battles, you know.” It’s the third time in forty minutes Jared has had to say this, and most of the heat’s gone by now.

Jensen shrugs. “Not like I haven’t wanted to bust his balls for years anyway.”

“Sure,” Jared says. He’s tired, is what he is.

“Besides, haven’t I been the knight to your damsel since day one?”

Jared rolls his eyes at Jensen’s smirk. “Shut up.” 

It’s the truth, though. This is who Jared is: the damsel. Jared is fucking tired of being the damsel. He’s just not sure he’ll get the chance to be anything else, ever again.

\--

The next day, Jared has a plan. He packs a sandwich and an apple, and he wolfs it all down in the first ten minutes of lunch. By the time Jensen makes it to their table, Jared’s collecting his trash. “Leaving already?” Jensen asks, looking bemused.

“Yup,” Jared says. “Got an appointment.”

Jensen’s eyebrow lifts, but Jared’s not up to explaining. It probably doesn’t matter; with stuff like this, Jensen’s telepathic anyway. Jensen asks, “Hey, we hanging out today?”

Jared pauses. He tries to think of a reason why he shouldn’t want to, and can’t. “Sure,” he says. Pick me up after practice.” 

After depositing his lunch tray in the bin, Jared escapes from the churning sea of odors that is the cafeteria and parks himself next to the vending machine. Almost every day, he’s figured out, Trina comes and buys a pack of Starbursts that she shares with her table. Sometimes one of her friends comes with, Vicky or Sheena from track. Mostly it’s just Trina, though, and that’s what Jared’s hoping for.

“Hi,” someone says.

Jared turns around to find Matt Cohen looking at him awkwardly. _Alpha_ Matt Cohen.

“Stay out of my space,” Jared says. He is not risking a repeat of what happened with Brock yesterday, even though what happened with Brock was clearly a fluke.

“Dude.” Matt lifts his hands in surrender. “I’m not going to try and mickey you. I swear.”

“Right,” Jared says. 

Mickey: when an alpha cons an unwilling omega into sex by the power of his body odor. Jared has heard of it, has always been skeptical that something so stupid even worked, but never gave it much thought either way. Not his problem.

Only, now it kind of is.

“Just, yeah,” Jared says, taking a step back. He’ll take shallow breaths and wait for Matt to go away. “Um, did you want something? I can...” He moves to step away from the vending machine, but Matt’s shaking his head.

“I just wanted to say hi,” he says.

Jared blinks. “Um. Hi.” Matt’s in algebra with him. He’s at the top of the social heap, mostly due to being born with a pitcher’s arm and having what girls have previously assured Jared are eyes ‘gray like the storm.’ That’s pretty much the entirety of what Jared knows about him. 

“So listen,” Matt says. “I know you’re probably not thinking about this yet, because of being new and all, and anyway you probably have a ton of people asking you, and we don’t really know each other—”

“That’s because we don’t talk,” Jared interrupts. “Like, ever.” Once upon a time, Jared had a filter. Maybe his fantastic new hormonal soup screwed that up, too.

“I know,” Matt says. “But I thought we could. Sometime. Like maybe at dinner, before prom?”

Jared blinks. He has no words. Finally, he manages, “Are you freaking kidding me?”

“No?” 

Prom is in three weeks. Jared’s a sophomore and therefore not old enough to go. At least, not without a date who _is_ old enough. Matt, say. “You’re asking me to prom.” 

Matt really does have stormy-gray eyes. Right now, they are very wide. “Uh, yeah. And dinner.”

“What the hell? Why would you ask me that?” 

“Because I’d like to go with you?” Matt’s looking more bewildered by the minute. Jared can relate. He takes a deep breath. The deep breath brings him hints of Matt, and the hints make him want to step closer to Matt, and...

Jared snorts violently, trying to get the scent out of his nose. “Do I have a _harass the new omega_ sign on my back?” he asks. “Dude, leave me alone. I’m not rolling over for you, and I’m not going to dinner with you, and I’m sure as heck not going to the prom as the bitch hanging off your arm.”

“Okay. Sure.” Matt’s backing up. “No problem.” He backs away, hands up in surrender, before turning and walking off, glancing over his shoulder one last time as goes. 

Now that Matt’s out of his space, Jared dares to take the deep breaths the situation calls for. He leans into the vending machine and closes his eyes. After a couple of minutes, Matt’s scent becomes just one more drop in a sea of them floating in currents all around Jared. Eventually Jared regains enough brain to realize that, wow, that was maybe a little harsh. Okay, a lot harsh. Sure, he doesn’t talk to Matt, but he doesn’t _hate_ Matt. Matt probably hates him, though. Jared probably should apologize.

Jared rubs at his face. The one thing he knows for sure is that he can’t talk to Trina right now. He’d really like not to talk to anyone. If he can manage not to make eye contact with another living person between now and the end of the school day, that will be a very positive thing. 

For the second day in a row, Jared spends the end of the lunch period at his locker. It’s getting pretty clean.

\--

Jared’s out of track practice and heading towards the sidewalk that leads home when Jensen pulls up in the parking lot. “You leaving without me?” Jensen calls.

Jared forgot about the hanging-out plan. “I dunno, man,” he says. Talking to people – even Jensen – is still not high on his priority list. “I’m not sure I’m up for it today. Homework.” 

“Yeah, right,” Jensen snorts. “Come on, what’s the deal? How’d your ‘appointment’ go?”

“It didn’t.”

“Oh.” Jensen’s expression is neutral. “That sucks.”

“Yeah.” Jared stares down at his shoes a moment. He decides to go for broke. “Look, I’m just gonna go home and, like, do a bunch of reading. You can come, if you want. I can’t promise it’ll be fun.”

Jensen’s shrug is deliberate in its casualness. “Fine by me.” Jared chooses not to think about what kind of poor-him vibes he’s giving off to warrant a response like that.

When they get to Jared’s house, Jared heads upstairs, and Jensen follows. Once Jared gets to his room, he does what he should have done last week. Or, like, years ago. He locks his door behind Jensen and waves him onto the bed, and then he starts rooting around underneath it. 

“So was it Trina?” Jensen asks, sprawled out on the bed. “Your appointment.”

“It was supposed to be,” Jared says.

“But?”

“I didn’t see her.” Here’s that pile of pamphlets his mom collected for him about being omega. He knew he’d stashed them under there somewhere. He leaves them in a tidy pile just beneath the bed frame, where Jensen can’t see them. Yet. 

“Okay.” Jensen’s tone is questioning, but he doesn’t say anything else.

Jared goes for the boxes in his closet next. He tosses the books out behind him as he finds them, one by one.

“Dude.”

Jared just about falls flat on his ass. Jensen’s crouched directly behind him, staring at... _The Manly Omega_. Jared vaguely remembers that one as being the one with the photo gallery. Jensen turns the book around and shoves it at Jared. And lo, there is the guy Jared particularly remembers, standing tall and proud in profile behind what must be nine months’ worth of pregnant belly.

“Is this gonna be you?” Jensen asks. He’s clearly aiming for nonchalance, and he’s failing badly. “Can you get knocked up now?” 

Jared swallows. “Maybe? I mean, probably not. You know how it is with cross-sex people. Fertility’s pretty low.” Maybe it was a really stupid idea, Jared bringing along a friend who’s pure beta on this little excursion of omega knowledge. 

“Right.” Jensen nods, apparently to himself.

“Look, if this is too weird, you don’t have to stay.”

Jensen stares down at the photo with an intensity that suggests he’s not actually seeing it. “This that homework you were talking about?”

“Yeah. I just... I knew I was omega, right? But I didn’t want to think about it before, and now there’s some stuff I figure I need to know.” He dares a glance at Jensen. 

Jensen nods, apparently to himself, and flips to the next page. Jared waits, not quite holding his breath. Finally, Jensen says, “Then I’m in.”

“Seriously?”

Jensen shrugs. “Pretty sure I know less about this than you do. Only betas in my house, remember?”

“Right.” Jared can’t think of a way of saying this that isn’t awkward. “Thanks, man. I, uh, I didn’t really want to do this by myself.”

Jensen shrugs, now smug as a cat. “No problem.” 

Eventually, between the under-the-bed space, the boxes in his closet, and the back of his bookshelf, Jared finds just about all the books and pamphlets his parents have given him about being an omega.

“I can’t believe my parents bought me this,” he says, waving _The New Omega’s Guide to Sex_ at Jensen.

Jensen eyes it skeptically. “Is that a new guide or a guide for new omegas?”

“I... have no idea.” Jared leafs briefly through it. He probably should figure out this hormonal stuff, like whether the utter crap he felt last week was really going to get better next time. It’s not what he’s looking for just now, though. He holds it out to Jensen. “You want?”

“Um,” Jensen says. He blinks at it. “You said you have a pussy?”

Jared drops the book like it’s on fire. Flushing yet again – he never stops these days, it feels like – he shoves it back under the bed with his foot. “Never mind,” he mumbles. Somehow, he forgot for a minute that sex for him and sex for Jensen aren’t the same thing anymore. Or weren’t ever, really, but he could pretend before, back when they ogled Jensen’s older brother’s badly-hidden skin mags together.

Another memory he apparently blocked out: having ever received a book titled _Loving Your Omega Self_. “Oh, God,” he says.

Jensen looks up from whichever castoff he’s been reading. “Aw, Ja-wed. Do you feel special?”

“Ugh.” Jared sticks the book at the bottom of his pile and vows to forget it again as quickly as possible.

In the end, he settles on _The Manly Omega_ , because that’s going to be pretty him-specific, right? And he can skip the photos. He sprawls out on his bed next to Jensen and starts to read.

A lot of what it says, he already knows from TV or sex ed class (during which he apparently acquired some knowledge after all). He’s now intimately familiar with the symptoms of heat, although he didn’t realize before that a tender abdomen was one of the regular signs. He figured it for stress. 

The changed social status, check. It gets better, the book claims. Once he asserts himself as still Jared, still the guy who runs distance and high jump and blows better raspberries than anyone in his class and knows ten different swear words in Japanese, people will get used to the idea of Jared-the-omega, and life will go on. In theory. That the book follows this up with an entire chapter on identifying and responding to sexual harassment, Jared does not find comforting.

The chapter after that is about relations between omegas and alphas. About two pages in, he slams the books shut. “This is total crap,” he says.

Jensen looks up. “What?”

“Just because I’m an omega, that doesn’t mean I’m stuck on alphas all of a sudden.”

“No?” Jensen says cautiously.

“No! I mean, okay, yes, those weepy teen dramas do have lots beta guys getting their hearts broken when their pre-omega girlfriends cross over tripping and falling into the arms of the first studly alpha they meet.”

“Right,” Jensen says, giving him the ‘Don’t upset the a crazy man’ stare. “And you know this how?”

“What?”

“The teen soaps? Here you’ve _always_ been a girl, and I never noticed.”

“Dude, shut up,” Jared says, and shoves him. Jensen topples right off the bed, hitting Jared’s floor with a thud. 

“Oh, right,” Jensen says from the floor. “Like that’s happening.” He launches himself at Jared and rolls them both over the other side of the bed.

Jared gets in one pretty pitiful punch, but Jensen crowds in after that, blocking what remains of Jared’s swing, and it devolves into a wrestling match. Jensen’s got more muscle, pound for pound – mostly because he hasn’t been stretching out vertically the way Jared has lately – but Jared has the advantage in reach. Eventually Jensen has Jared in a headlock, sort of.

“Truce?” Jensen says.

And, just, no. Any other day Jared wouldn’t give a crap – it’s _Jensen_ – but today he shoves over backward and rolls on top of Jensen. Jensen grunts. “Dude, get off me!” Jensen says. He beats at Jared’s shoulder with the heel of his hand. 

“Truce?”

Jensen groans. “Fine. Truce!”

Jared moves himself far enough off Jensen to give him some range of motion. They crawl out from under each other, rest their backs on Jared’s bedframe, and stare at the wall for a while. “My sister used to watch a lot of teen soaps,” Jared says finally. “When she babysat us.”

“Sure,” Jensen says drily.

Jared shoves Jensen’s shoulder, hard. “Dude,” Jensen says, getting himself upright again. Judging from his tone, he might be pissed. Sometimes it’s a little hard to tell with Jensen. After a moment, though, he looks Jared in the eye and says, “I didn’t mean anything by it. Before.”

“I know what you meant,” Jared says. “You meant I’m not...” He shrugs, hunting for the words. “I’m not really a guy anymore. I’m like this godawful hybrid of guy parts and girl parts, and it wouldn’t matter what kind of alpha douchiness I tried to pull, it’d just be compensating, right? Because I’ve always been a girl underneath.” He wishes he were furious right now, full of righteous rage at Jensen and biology and fate. Mostly he’s just tired.

“Look, man,” Jensen begins, and Jared snorts. Jensen rolls his eyes, takes a breath, and starts again. “I don’t really know how to do this. I’ve never had a, whaddya call it, a cross-sex friend before. And I’ll probably shoot my mouth off, because I do that. But don’t write me off, okay? Just tell me what I’m supposed to do.”

Jared laughs bitterly. “Like I know? I don’t even know what _I’m_ supposed to do.”

“Well, I’m guessing calling you a girl is off the table.”

Jared hesitates. If Jensen were going to poke at the chinks in Jared’s armor, he’d have done it years ago. No point in deflecting now. “I’d appreciate it.”

“You know I only say it because I don’t actually think you’re a girl. It isn’t funny otherwise.”

“I know.”

Jensen inspects his hands, palm-up in his lap. “Look, if there’s other stuff, you just have to tell me, you know? And I’ll shut up. You don’t even have to grind my face into the carpet first.”

Jared huffs a laugh. “Okay.”

“Okay. So.” Jensen clears his throat theatrically. “What about the teen soaps?”

“Right.” Jared casts back to find the dangling strands of that conversation. “So there’s lots of stories where the girl likes alphas all of a sudden, right?”

“Like with me and Lanie.”

“Uh. Yeah.” Exactly like Jensen and Lanie. She primed into an omega last fall, and suddenly Jensen wasn’t the guy of her dreams anymore. Jared isn’t actually convinced Jensen ever was, but Jensen thought so and reciprocated in kind, so the ‘you’re not alpha enough for me’ speech hit pretty hard. “But Lanie was a girl who liked guys, and now she still likes guys!”

“Just not me,” Jensen mutters.

“Yeah,” Jared says, feeling awkward again. “But still, alpha guys are a subset of guys, right? It’s part of the almighty Venn diagram.”

“Uh huh.” Jensen’s giving him a raised eyebrow. 

Jared has always liked girls. They’re pretty, and they’re soft and nice to hold (well, not his sisters, particularly, but he’s optimistic that it’s better with other people). They roll their eyes appreciatively when he tells stupid jokes, or else they grimace, but the effect feels about the same. Carrie Davis made out with him a couple of times last year, and he thought they might have gotten a lot further if her family hadn’t moved to Singapore mid-semester. The experience didn’t blow his mind, but he has an idea that it could have once they both got a better feel for the process.

He _likes_ girls.

“But guys who liked girls and now like alpha guys, that’s a whole different thing. There’s no intersection in that diagram. Right?”

Jensen rubs at the back his head. “There’s alpha girls.”

That pretty much stops Jared in his tracks. He tries to think of alpha girls at school. There have to be some, right? Just like, statistically, there should be about four other omega guys up the same shit creek he is?

“Sheila Hornsby,” Jared says finally. She’s a senior, she’s queen of everything, and she’s even more terrifying than Katie. The chances of her looking twice at Jared are subzero, unless she decides he’s, like, an interesting specimen. Of what, Jared dares not even speculate.

“She can’t be the only one,” Jensen says.

“That’s not the point!” Jared says. “The point is, teen soaps are _not_ an accurate representation. I mean, my folks have friends who are mixed beta/omega couples, and they seem okay. Yeah, maybe there are a few omega girls out there who spazz out when they get their prime heat and never quite make it back, but that’s extreme, right?”

“Uh, Jared,” Jensen says.

“Yeah?” Jared’s feeling a little flushed in the fervor of his indignation.

“Who’re you trying to convince, exactly?”

“This stupid book!” Jared reaches up over the edge of the bed and grabs the book from where it’s still sitting on his comforter. He finds the place he was reading and thrusts it at Jensen.

Jared doesn’t really care what his manly omega book says. He doesn’t care about the bitch boys it quotes, the ones whose entire orientation shifted after their first heat. They were probably just waiting for the excuse to spread their legs and beg to be tied. They are nothing like Jared.

“So you haven’t been, uh—” Jensen glances down at the book. “—experiencing any involuntary attractions lately?”

“No!”

“Okay, okay,” Jensen says.

“I’m sick of this,” Jared says, standing. “Let’s go see if Mom got any more frozen pizza.” He unlocks the door and stomps out, not caring if Jensen follows.

This is who Jared is: Jared’s the guy who’s going to ask out Trina Mathers. And if Brock Kelly so much as looks at him funny, Jared’s going to punch him in the face.

\--

Jared survives another school day of theatrical sniffs and knowing glances and extreme lunch awkwardness. Brody and Travis are back, but they aren’t looking Jared in the eye; apparently their plan for ignoring the change in him is to pretend he doesn’t exist. Meanwhile Doerflinger prods at topics Jared doesn’t even want to think about, much less verbalize.

Jared has figured out the key to asking Trina Mathers on a date: he avoids the vending machine. In fact, he puts that entire hallway off-limits. Instead he waits for the fifteen-minute lull between the last bell and track practice to find her.

She’s facing away from him, head-deep in her locker. It’s almost instinctive now to take a quick, sharp sniff as he gets closer. Mostly, he gets the tang of something artificial and fruity. It’s a hazard, being omega: so many betas around him over-scent themselves. Taking too deep a whiff of too strong a perfume is a sure way to give himself a headache. Trina’s isn’t so bad, but he can barely find her true scent underneath the fake fruit one. What he can smell is bland, inoffensive. Oatmeal is the comparison that comes to mind, but he throws it out.

To crowd out other inconvenient thoughts, he says, “Hi.”

Trina turns around. “Jared, hey. How are you?” she asks, her emphasis on the second word. Her smile is wide and sincere, and Jared quashes the irritation at how every single person he has ever met feels the need to ask him how he is.

“Good,” he says. “I’m good. You?”

“The sets are mostly done,” she says. “We’re working on costumes now. They’re going to be really cool when they’re finished, but...”

“But first you have to make them?” It tickles Jared that as far Trina’s considered, _How are you?_ and _How’s the play?_ are synonymous questions.

“Yeah.” Her dimples show when she smiles.

Okay, Jared. Time to do your thing. “Listen, do you know a band called The Inevitable Shoe? They’re local.”

“Oh, wow, I love them!” she says, her face lighting up. “I’ve only seen them once, you know? But they’re amazing. They put on a really good show, and I think the main girl who sings writes most of the music, too. Besides, _every_ band needs an electric violin.”

“They’re playing at the college next week,” Jared says casually. Maybe casually. Casual is the intended mode, anyway.

“I know, I saw the posters! I don’t know if I’m going to be able to go, though.”

“Yeah?” Jared tries not to sound disappointed. He was starting to think this was the perfect date opportunity, but he can come up with something else. Sure.

“Yeah, it’s only two nights before dress rehearsal.”

Might as well try. “Well, if you could go, I was thinking maybe we could go together?”

“Oh.” She blinks in... surprise? Not overwhelming disgust, so that’s good. “Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, if you can get done with play stuff.” She eyes him intently. It unnerves him. “I mean, also assuming you’re not dating anyone right now. Or planning to date. Or considering the possibility of dating.”

“Well, I kind of was,” she says slowly. Jared feels his heart fall. At least a half-inch drop there, he’s sure of it. “But then the guy primed into an omega. I didn’t figure he’d be interested anymore.”

“Oh,” he says. “Oh! Um, he is! I am!”

She starts to grin. “Then it’s a good thing I was talking about you, huh?”

He grins back. He’s too excited to feel embarrassed. “Definitely.”

“So, Tuesday?”

“Tuesday,” he agrees.

\--

On Friday the nurse calls him in during third period and quizzes him about his first week back. Does he have headaches? 

(Did, but they’re getting better. Thank you, aspirin.) 

Is he noticing other physiological changes? 

(What, like being super-aware of a set of genitals he barely knew he had before?) 

Has his new omega status affected his relationships at home or in school? 

(Lunch is now his least favorite period. P.E. is an excuse for Rogstad, who’s a freaking _beta_ , to body check him into walls, grab a quick grope of Jared’s ass, and then waltz away like nothing happened. Also, random alphas keep asking him to prom. 

Otherwise, nope, no change.) 

Has he decided whether he wants to move to the girls-and-omegas’ locker room?

(Because he’d stick out less there than in with the guys? Um, no. The guys _look_ a lot, as if sudden-onset x-ray vision is going to let them see the hole Jared’s hiding behind his dick, but they don’t touch, mostly. Jared’ll take what he can get.)

In general, would he say he’s adjusting? 

(Absolutely. He is one fully-adjusted omega.)

He tells the nurse he’s fine, and he sticks to that story until she lets him go.

Because he is. He’s totally fine.


	3. Chapter 3

Jared _has_ been on dates before. The making out with Carrie Davis did occasionally happen in places other than behind the bleachers. He reminds himself of this several times on Tuesday, because by the time school gets out he is a mass of nerves – nerves like worms, squirming and heaving. Squirming and heaving is also pretty much what his stomach is doing, it so happens.

He’s pretty sure Trina is genuinely interested in him, and he tells himself so as he’s deciding which khaki pants should go with which shirt. He’s sort of all limbs this year – which he can’t _wait_ to grow out of or into or whatever – but he’s not hideous, and that’s another point in his favor.

It’s stupid to be this nervous. It’s just, this feels big, and not only because he’s been crushing on Trina since the year started. He’ll admit that to himself, even though he didn’t admit it to Jensen – Jensen, who responded to his joyous datte announcement with a skeptical eyebrow and a shrug. This is important, this getting-out-and-being-normal thing. It’s like the book said, he tells himself: he just has to remind everyone he’s still Jared.

First, though, he had to convince his mom. “Are you sure you’re ready for dealing with that many people at once?” she asked Sunday night when he mentioned the plan. “I remember being pretty claustrophobic around crowds after I primed.”

“Mo-om,” he said. “I’m fine at school. In the hallways? In the lunchroom? Plenty of people.” Besides, no way was he going to back out now, after he’d already gotten Trina to agree. 

Eventually his mom said yes. “But if it gets to be too much, you leave. Do you understand me, Jared? You walk right out that door.”

“I get it,” he said. Thank God the campus is dry or she’d never let him go at all.

After dinner, his dad drives him over to pick up Trina and drops them both off in front of the college’s student union with a warning that if Jared doesn’t call him by eleven he’s coming in after them.

Jared’s only been to the club venue on campus once and is totally prepared to go looking for a map like the manly wilderness explorer he is, but Trina threads her fingers through his and leads the way. She comes to poetry slams here some nights, she tells him, and he laughs in unsurprised delight. They stop at the fast-food counter for fries, and he treats her to a strawberry shake.

It’s dark inside despite the lights; the walls are painted black and the furnishings are all industrial chic. On the balcony they find an empty table overlooking the floor. There aren’t too many people yet. The ones Jared does see are mostly older and cooler than Jared; they have a sheen of maturity about them that no one at his high school has, not even the seniors. 

Trina dips her fries in her shake, and when Jared makes a gross-out grimace, she dips another and brandishes it in his face, dripping, until he lets her feed it to him. The combination isn’t as weird as he expects; it’s actually kind of okay. That sparkle in Trina’s eye, though? That’s freaking awesome.

More people filter in, crowding the floor and the balcony. So many odors pressed in so close make Jared a little dizzy. Trina notices and says over the rising hum of the crowd, “It’ll get better once the music starts. Everyone’ll go dance.” Jared recognizes the assumption that _they_ won’t go dance, and feels pathetic but grateful. Being here is harder than he was expecting it to be. 

Trina reaches across the table and curls her fingers around his, and he thinks how if he were a little farther from the edge of claustrophobia, this moment right here would be on his list of top ten ever. Trina’s as awesome as he always thought she was, and she _likes him_ , and other than a little more sanity, he can’t think of much else he wants in life.

Well. Sex. 

The thought takes him very bad places very fast, places it’d never have occurred to him to go a month ago, and he slams the mental lid on them ASAP. He must have made a face, because Trina’s peering at him with concern.

“Somebody’s perfume,” Jared mumbles. He coughs to demonstrate, and she winces in sympathy. Thank God she knows he just primed; otherwise she’d just figure he was spastic.

The lights dim, and The Inevitable Shoe walks onstage. Jared knew nothing about them before this, just that the concert’s timing was convenient and that, judging from the poster, the lead singer dressed a little like Trina. The fact that Trina knew and loved them was pure chance. The style’s what Jared in the privacy of his own mind refers to as emo rock, which is a country mile away from his preference, but he grants that the girl on the electric violin is pretty amazing. Besides, Trina’s grinning and clapping her hands above her head, so Jared doesn’t give a crap what the band sounds like.

After four or five songs, though, Trina is gazing wistfully down on the crowd. “You want to go down there?” Jared asks during a lull.

She hesitates, desire clearly warring with guilt. “I’m not leaving you here by yourself,” she says. 

“I think I need some air,” he says. It’s not a lie; much longer and he might puke from sheer exhaustion of the nose. “Meet you by the food counter in a while?”

She nods. He leads the way down the stairs out of some half-formed, chivalrous idea of breaking the trail. At the bottom she waves at him and sidles into the crowd. He turns the other way and heads out past odors of grease and sugar, through a door into the cavernous lobby of the student commons. It’s better there, but not great. He pushes through the big double doors and breathes in the delicious April air. The chill stings the lining of his nose, but he doesn’t care one tiny bit.

It’s going pretty well, he thinks, this dating thing, stupid nose and stupid jumpy hormones notwithstanding.

After he stands there ten minutes or so cleansing his lungs, the light jacket he wore tonight isn’t cutting it anymore, and he heads back inside. He’s just turning towards the sound of thumping bass when he notices a face across the lobby that he recognizes. It’s Matt Cohen. 

Jared’s maybe been feeling a little overwhelmed, and a familiar face is a friendly one. Jared lifts a hand and waves before he really thinks through who it is he’s waving to. Too late to abort now, though, with his arm already stuck in the air. Matt gives him the skeptical eyeball and turns away. Jared suddenly decides that this is something he needs to fix, and he needs to fix it now. He jogs over to Matt, who’s standing next to a larger, hairier version of Matt. A brother, Jared remembers vaguely.

Now that he’s here, Jared has no idea what to say. “Uh, hey.”

“Hi, Jared,” Matt says warily. Scary Hairy Brother gives Jared the evil eye, but Matt waves him off. 

“Could I talk to you a minute?” Jared asks.

Matt shrugs. “I guess.” He follows Jared a few strides towards the door, far enough to be out immediate earshot.

“Look, I’m sorry about before,” Jared says.

“Yeah?” Matt says. He crosses his arms and gives no quarter.

“I just primed, you know?” It’s a magic phrase, Jared’s discovered. People’s expressions soften in sympathy, and they give him a pass on whatever stupid new-omega thing he’s just done or, the other day in gym class, a stupid totally unrelated thing he’d done.

It works on Matt, too. His shoulders relax, and his grimace smoothes out into something more pleasant. “I get it, man. Too soon. Those first couple of weeks are insane.”

 _ **Never** will be too soon_ , Jared doesn’t say. Not a great finish to his apology. “Anyway, I’m sorry. But,” he adds, and pauses.

“Yeah?”

“I still don’t get it. Why me?” The question’s been bothering Jared.

Matt rolls his eyes. “Because Rosie Venegas just dumped me for some asshole alpha in Cannon Falls, and I figured maybe it’d be different with a guy. Anyway, you seemed cool.”

“Ugh.” Jared hides his eyes behind his hand. “I guess you got over that idea.”

“No, seriously, I get it. You’re not the only guy in school who’s ever primed, Padalecki.”

It takes Jared a moment to process this. “Oh, you mean that adrenaline-fueled King of the World rush you alphas go through?” he retorts. The words are light, though, no bite. God, he’s teasing Matt Cohen like they’re friends. Or like they’re flirting, except that’s definitely not what they’re doing.

“Yeah,” Matt says musingly. “Pretty much like the crazy hot sexfest _you_ had a couple of weeks ago.”

It occurs to Jared that this is, in fact, a seriously awkward conversation to have with an alpha. His face warms. Also it occurs to him that Matt really does smell _really good_ , which thought does not improve the blushing. “Uh, it wasn’t really like that.” He trails off when Matt cocks an eyebrow.

“Yeah, priming isn’t that much fun for alphas, either,” Matt says.

Oh. “I’m kind of a dick, aren’t I?”

“Kind of,” Matt agrees. 

“Man, I’m sorry.”

Matt shrugs. “It’s cool.”

“Look, I’m gonna shut up and get out of your face.”

“Rats,” Matt says. Okay, that’s definitely flirting, and Matt’s smirking at Jared like he knows Jared knows it.

“Um, see you.” Jared takes a few steps back, turns, and walks away as quickly as feels marginally dignified.

At least he’s fairly confident Matt doesn’t hate him anymore.

He finds Trina sitting across from the food counter, munching on a corn dog. “This is disgusting,” she says, brandishing it at him. “Do you see any actual meat? Or even actual corn?”

He sits down at the tiny table.”You can’t judge corn dogs by their parents. They’re emancipated. Independent food entities.” 

“That must be why they taste so good.” Trina takes a hearty bite out of the side. Indistinctly, she says, “You’re going to die of heart disease by the time you’re forty.”

“You’re the one with the corn dog,” Jared says.

She snickers and holds the stick and its one remaining bite to his mouth. When he leans in for the bite, she snatches it back, and he reaches for the stick to wrest it away from her. 

“Ah ah!” she says. “No hands!” 

She offers the corn dog, and this time she lets him get his teeth into the last chunk. It squirts indeterminate meat juices all over his chin. He swallows and wipes his face off, and when he’s finished he realizes Trina’s grinning not in his general vicinity, not at the music or the food or some stray thought, but straight at him.

“Come on,” she says. She tosses the stick in garbage and then grabs his hand. He follows her out into the main lobby, up the stairs, and out the doors onto the quad. In the flush of his excitement, Jared doesn’t even feel the cold. Trina guides them down a sidewalk lit by old-fashioned globe lamps, and then off into the shadows to a boulder just the right height for sitting. From here Jared can see down into town and across the river to Shackleton College, with its orderly twinkle of lights.

“How’d you know about this place?”

“My sister went to school here,” Trina says. “She showed me. Don’t let that kill the mood or anything.”

Jared chuckles, although mention of ‘the mood’ makes him a little anxious. “Okay.”

After they silently contemplate the view a minute or so, Trina says, “I’m glad you asked me out.”

“Yeah,” Jared says. “I’m glad, too.” As dates go, it’s been mostly perfect. Except for the too-crowded feeling, but that’s not an issue out here. “You know, you’re different outside of school.”

“Yeah? Good or bad?”

“Good!” he hastens to say. “Just, in school you’re kind of... shy?”

“High school’s stupid,” she says. “I mean, I love drama club, but all the cliquey politics and stuff?” Her shoulders hunch, halfway to the hermit-crab posture she often has at school. It makes Jared sorry he said anything. “I can’t wait for college,” she says.

“Well, you’ll be awesome at it when you get there,” Jared says. “You’re already, like...” He waves his hand at her, reaching for words.

“Like?” she asks, looking amused.

“An adult,” he says. “With goals and identity and all that stuff colleges want.”

She laughs. “Is that what it’s good for? Scholarship apps?”

“Um...”

“You know, you don’t have to be the same guy you are in high school, either.”

“Wait, is this the inspiring ‘Be all you can be’ speech?”

Trina snorts. “I’m not the army, so no. Seriously, though, what high school says you have to be? It’s shit.”

Jared blinks at the language, which isn’t like her. “Okay.”

“Fine,” Trina says, laughing. “I’m off my soapbox now, promise.” She rubs comfortingly at his shoulder. “So, speaking of me not being shy, is this the part where I get to kiss you?”

“Um,” Jared says. “Okay?”

“Or not,” Trina says dryly.

“No, I want to.” Of course he does. He’s dreamed about it often enough.

“No, I’m not making you do anything you don’t want to do,” Trina says primly. In the shadowed glow of the lamps, he sees her scoot a few inches further away from him. “No kissing, then.”

“Are you serious?”

Suddenly she’s leaning up and in, pressing soft warm lips to his. “Nope,” she whispers against his mouth. “Definitely not.”

It’s totally hot. Of course Jared wants this; he’s wanted it for months. He kisses her back, more or less how he remembered it with Carrie, although Trina’s clearly had more experience than Carrie. Or him, for that matter. It’s not like he and Carrie never discovered tongue, but when he feels Trina’s teasing at his lips, he hardly knows how to respond. It’s practically accidental that he opens his mouth to let her in.

Kissing Trina is wet, is what it is. Also warm, and hard (Trina’s teeth flat against his tongue and nibbling at his lower lip), and soft (everything else about Trina). It’s composed of all the parts that are supposed to make up kissing. 

Somehow, though, it’s mostly just awkward.

After fifteen seconds or so, Trina stops with the tongue and the nibbling and pulls back. “You’re not into this,” she says.

“Um.” Kissing Trina was not the all-consuming experience he imagined it would be. However, telling that to Trina is clearly not on the table. 

“Too fast, huh?”

“Yeah,” he says. That must be it. Definitely. “Sorry.”

After a pause, she asks, “Is it an omega thing?”

“What, being a bad kisser?” He’s dooming the reputation of all omega-kind, all by himself.

She laughs. “I mean, wanting to go slow. You like, I dunno, soft and tender?”

“God, I hope not,” Jared says.

“Mm,” Trina says. Something in her tone suggests to Jared that she might have preferred an affirmative vs. whatever conclusion she’s drawn instead. “Well. Time to go back?” She pulls out her cell phone and shows Jared the time, LCD-bright. It’s ten-thirty. “I guess you’ll want to call your dad pretty soon.”

“Yeah,” Jared says.

The walk back up the hill is quiet. Jared isn’t sure whether or not it’s awkward. When they get under a light and he can be sure of seeing her expression, he slows and asks, “Are we okay?”

She turns and considers him a moment, brow creased. Finally, she replies, “Just so we’re clear, I don’t think kissing or not kissing is, like, the end of the world. And there’s always practice.” Jared snorts, and Trina grins faintly. “But,” she continues cautiously, “you’re still interested, right?”

“What? Yes!”

She nods firmly. “Okay, then.” Her grin is brighter this time. She holds her hand out, Jared takes it, and they walk the rest of the way to the commons with their fingers entwined.

\--

Jared doesn’t get a chance to talk to Jensen at school, but they get burgers afterwards and Jared tells him all about Trina. Jensen listens patiently enough, but with no real enthusiasm. Jared eventually gets frustrated and takes off, telling Jensen he has homework to do.

\--

Of course Jared goes to see Trina’s play Friday night. It’s _The Wizard of Oz_ , and Trina’s one of the attendants in the Emerald City. “Acting is fun,” she explained to him during their date. “But costuming is better, and there’s not enough time to be Dorothy and build sets, too.”

Jared sneaks into the back row just before the curtain goes up; he doesn’t want to deal with any more crowding than he absolutely has to. One of these days he won’t need to plan his entire life around how many of other people’s scents he’s able handle in a given space and time frame, but, as Aragorn said, it is not this day.

The production isn’t high art, Jared supposes, but most people in the chorus are from the school choir, so the singing isn’t too bad. Also, not that Jared’s biased or anything, but the sets and costumes look way cooler than those usually afforded by drama department budgets. At play’s end, though, Jared’s pretty glad to get away from all the bodies. He ducks out the back first thing just as the lights go black and slips out the main school doors for some air.

“Doing okay?”

Something in Jared’s stomach curls pleasantly in on itself. He turns around. It’s Matt. “Hey.” 

“We meet again,” Matt says gravely.

“Uh, yeah,” Jared says. He does not blush, because the reason he’s even standing next to this wall is because he came to see his girlfriend – right? girlfriend? they’re dating now, yes? – and besides, his body has no say over what makes sort of person makes him tingly. Anyway, it’s dark, so any blushing that happens is irrelevant. 

Matt inhales, and it occurs to Jared that no one gives crap what he _looks_ like anymore, because they can smell everything important. Okay, definitely blushing now. 

_Girlfriend_ , some reasonable part of his brain says pointedly. “Play wasn’t bad, huh?” Jared says, for something to say.

“My sister’s in the choir,” Matt says. “Therefore, the play was awesome.” Jared laughs. It's clearly the thing to do. “What about you? Sibling? Homework assignment? What convinced you to drag your ass here on a Friday night?”

“Friend,” Jared says. “Helped design the sets and stuff.” It occurs to him that there were zero gendered pronouns in that sentence. He shrugs the thought away.

“Cool,” Matt says.

Matt is standing at least five feet away from Jared, which is decently outside Jared’s new fuck-me-now alpha proximity zone, but Jared still wants to kiss Matt. He wants to kiss Matt a lot. The vague wistful thoughts about knots Jared’s had the last few weeks? He’s thinking every single one of them right now.

“Dude, Padalecki,” Matt says. “I either need to get a lot closer to you or a hell of a lot farther away.”

The words blow away some of Jared’s brain-fog. “Um.” Not the want, though. He thinks he could be standing across the parking lot from Matt right now and still want. He thinks maybe this has nothing to do with proximity.

“Which’ll it be?” Matt’s voice is gentle, which is not what Jared wants at all. “I am totally prepared to dry hump you against this wall, or just make out, or whatever.”

Okay, those are things Jared’s interested in. God, is he.

“Or, you know, leave. But I gotta tell you, this middle distance thing is killing me.”

 _Trina,_ comes the faint cry from that same reasonable part of Jared’s brain, now choking to death on lust and hormones. This is your life, Jared Padalecki. Are you this guy?

“I can’t,” Jared says. “I’m sorry. My friend...”

“Oh,” Matt says, suddenly distant. “Right. Your friend.”

“I’m sorry.” Jared’s backing up now, towards the door he walked out of earlier. “It’s not that I don’t want to.”

“I’ll try to take comfort in that,” Matt says drily. Not that Jared’s much judge at the moment, but he doesn’t think Matt sounds pissed. It doesn’t matter. It’s not Jared’s biggest problem if the guy he was just knot-teasing is pissed.

He has to find Trina.

\--

Jared feels like a steaming pile of crap, hunting down Trina in the midst of her post-play jubilation with what he has to say. He finds her in the drama classroom, wiping stage make-up from a munchkin. As soon as she spots him, all her bright-eyed chatter stops. She hands the rag to the munchkin and comes over to Jared, who’s skulking by the door.

“What is it? Is everything okay?” Her open worry makes it all worse.

“I can’t, Trina,” Jared says. The words are abrupt and too sharp; he knows what he has to say, but has no brain left to plan out how to say it.

“Can’t what?”

“I can’t, with you.” He gestures frantically between them. 

Her eyes widen, more with disbelief than anything, he thinks. “What?”

“Look, I really like you. Like, a lot! I think you’re awesome, and the play was great.”

“But,” she says. She crosses her arms.

“I wanted to kiss Matt Cohen,” he blurts. It sounds as damning spoken aloud as it did in his head. Trina says nothing, just watches him. “Outside, just now. He was there, and...” And she definitely doesn’t want to hear the details. Brain catches up with tongue, and Jared stops.

“Oh,” Trina says faintly. “Why didn’t you?”

“Because, you... Because. I’d be a dick if I did that.” Except he thinks he might be one anyway.

After Trina mulls over this for a moment, she says, “So you’re going to break up with me and then kiss him?”

“I don’t know!” Jared says. “God, I don’t know _anything_.”

Trina huffs. When she looks up at him, her eyes are wet. She reaches over, rubs his shoulder, and says, “So you like alphas. Jared, no one’s surprised except you.”

“God,” Jared says again.

Trina angles her face away from him. “I wish you hadn’t gotten my hopes up.” She glances sideways at him. “I liked you, too.”

“I still like you,” he persists.

“But do you want to kiss me?” she says.

“You said kissing wasn’t everything,” he says uselessly. It’s useless because he is in the middle of _breaking up with her_ : Trina, girl of his dreams and girlfriend (-ish) of three whole days.

“I can handle you not wanting to make out,” she says. “I can’t handle you not wanting to make out with _me_.” She scrubs at her eye with a knuckle. “Look, just go. I’m not... I can’t be your comfort right now, okay? Go find another shoulder to cry on.”

“I’m sorry,” Jared says again.

She shrugs. “Yeah. I know.” Much good it does either of them.

\--

What Jared wants to do is run. He likes running. It’s great for thinking if he wants to think, putting the same problem on a loop in his head until it’s unraveled itself, and it’s great for when he doesn’t want to think, because then all he has to do is match the mindless rhythm in his head to the one beaten out by his feet. There’s nowhere to run at this time of night, though, not like he wants to, on and on until brain and feet both stop from sheer fatigue. 

Walking’s the best he’s got. From the school parking lot, he points himself in a direction, and he goes. It takes him maybe twenty minutes of fevered strides to realize he’s heading towards Jensen’s. It figures. It’s late, but not so late on a Friday night that Jared can’t show up at Jensen’s front door unannounced, which he’s been doing since they were twelve.

“Jared,” Jensen’s mom says, warmly enough even though he’s caught her already in her bedtime sweats. “Haven’t seen you in a couple of weeks, come on in...” She trails off as she gets a look at him. “Is everything okay?”

Jared hunches into his shoulders, feeble protection though they are. “I’m fine,” he says. “I’m just looking for Jensen.”

“Basement,” she says, throwing a thumb over her shoulder, expression wry.

Jared finds Jensen where he expected to, parked on the couch in the semi-dark, face lit only by _Mania_. “Hey, dude,” Jensen says. “Grab another controller, I’ll commission you in.”

“No, thanks.” Jared sinks into the couch next to Jensen and just breathes, slow and deep and careful. He isn’t going to cry, because being the guy who cries would be bad enough, but being just another weepy omega would be worse.

Jensen, as previously mentioned, is occasionally telepathic. Or maybe just observant. “What’s up?” he says, glancing over at Jared.

Jared leans back, nestling deeper into the couch. Maybe if sits here long enough, gravity will win out and the couch will swallow him whole. “Play your game, man.”

Jensen shrugs and turns back to the screen. It takes Jared a good five minutes, watching Jensen's loose arrows at the crazed überalpha hordes, before he manages to say, “I broke up with Trina.”

“Yeah?” Jensen glances sidelong at him. “That was fast. Play was pretty bad, huh?”

Jared wants to punch him. He holds it in and pushes forward. “You know Matt Cohen?”

“Alpha, junior, darling of the football team and girls everywhere?”

“I almost—” stuck my tongue down his throat, jumped him, let him do any damn thing he liked to me “—kissed him.”

Deliberately, Jensen pauses his game and lays his controller down next to him on the couch. “You don’t say.”

“Like a bitch in heat,” Jared says, savoring the slap of the words in the air. They sound right. They sting like he thinks they should.

Jensen takes a deep breath. “Look, Jared. You’re not in heat. Not anymore. Have you considered that maybe you’re just a bitch?”

“What?” Jared says blankly.

“A bitch,” Jensen says, lingering over the word. “A guy who breaks some beta girl’s heart when his hormones kick in, which he knew damn well was gonna happen.”

“I don’t think she’s exactly broken-hearted,” Jared ventures. He’s not going to think about the hurt in her expression. What he’s done isn’t good, but it isn’t _irreparable_. “Anyway, I didn’t think you even liked Trina.”

Jensen sniffs, peers around everywhere that isn’t Jared. “Betas gotta stick together.”

“Against me? You’re my best friend!” 

Jensen turns to stare. “Apparently not. Because if I were, then you would have _told me_. What kind of asshole doesn’t tell his best friend which _sex_ he’s going to be?”

“I’m sorry,” Jared says, because it seems like the thing to say. “I didn’t mean for it to be a secret.”

“Bullshit.”

“I just didn’t want anyone to know.” Jensen snorts, but Jared forges ahead. “I didn’t want it to be real.”

“How’s that going for you?” asks Jensen. 

Jared bristles, but it’s not like he didn’t come here looking for, as Trina put it, a shoulder to cry on. He goes for the truth. “Not that well.”

“No shit,” Jensen says. 

“I just want things to be the same,” Jared mumbles.

“Well, they’re not, okay? You’re not the same. You ever figure there’s some other people out here, getting knocked around every time you start flailing? Me and Trina and this Matt guy you’re leading around by the nose?” Jensen punches the blanket draped over the back of the sofa. His fist sinks into it. “God, you’re just like fucking Lanie.”

Oh. “Is... is that what you’re mad about?” Jared asks carefully. “Lanie?”

“Forget Lanie. I’m mad at _you_ ,” Jensen says. 

“I’m sorry,” Jared says again. He means it more this time. “I didn’t... I’ve been sort of freaking out.”

“For five years?” 

Jared doesn’t have an answer to that. He shrinks a little further in on himself. “I don’t know what I’m doing, okay? I have no idea.” He thought Jensen would be able to deal with that. Or, really, Jared hoped he would, in those rare moments when he let himself think about priming at all.

“Yeah, well, that’s pretty damn clear.”

“You said it didn’t matter,” Jared says. Under Jensen’s gaze, he feels like a caterpillar in a jar: trapped and naked. “You said you didn’t care.”

“I thought we were bros,” Jensen says.

“We are! Of course we are.”

“You’re not even beta, man.”

This is true. The simple, solemn fact of this is irrefutable. It strips Jared bare of all non-essentials, all the stories he’s clothed himself in and all the half-truths he’s let stand; all that’s left is Jared: omega. 

“Yeah, well.” Jared’s hands have curled themselves into fists at his sides; deliberately, he opens them and lets them fall loose in his lap. “I wish I was.” He laughs. It isn’t a cheery sound. “God, do you have any idea how much easier this would be if I was beta? I could still go out with Trina, and freaking Rogstad wouldn’t always be trying to breath my air. You and I wouldn’t even be having this conversation.” Jared rubs at his forehead. Eventually his hand settles over his eyes.

The silence that follows goes on a long time. 

Finally, hesitantly, Jensen asks, “Does it suck that much?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it pretty much does.”

“I’m sorry.”

Jared drops his hand from his face and turns to look at Jensen. “For what?”

Jensen doesn’t meet Jared’s eyes. “That it sucks. It sounds rough.” He stares down at his hands. “I wish you’d told me.”

“I know.” Jared supposes he gets it, a little; his own body’s betrayed him enough in the past couple of weeks for betrayal to feel familiar. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, well.” Jensen looks over finally. His smile looks genuine, if a little sickly. “There anything else I should know about? Now’s your chance.”

Jared gives that a moment. Nothing comes to mind. Then an idea forms, and he licks his lips. “Uh.”

Jensen freezes.

“While I was on my heat?” Jared kind of can’t believe he’s going here.

“Yeah?”

“I think I might have gotten pregnant.”

There’s a beat. Jensen stares as Jared like he’s never seen him before. “You didn’t.”

Jared curls his lip, just a little, and the next moment Jensen has shoved him clean off the couch. Jared collapses on the floor laughing so hard he can’t even start to catch his breath.

“I’m going to fucking kill you,” Jensen says.

“God, your face.”

“You. Are. Dead.” 

Jared manages to pause long enough to get a glimpse of Jensen’s expression. Jensen’s rolling his eyes, so apparently the joke is forgivable. Eventually Jared recovers, more or less, his cheeks aching and his head light from too much oxygen. He lets himself sprawl out on the floor, and he closes his eyes.

“You’re a fucking moron,” Jensen says.

It’s possibly true, but even so, Jared is a fucking moron who feels a whole lot better than he did half an hour ago. Maybe this is survivable. If he can joke about it – if he can joke about it _with Jensen_ , not that he realized before that that was even an issue – then maybe his life didn’t end two weeks ago last Wednesday. Maybe there’s hope.

Jensen clears his throat. “You could try talking to, like, your mom.”

“About?”

“You know.” There’s a pause. “About the omega stuff.”

“Dude!” Jared sits up and makes the epic face that requires. “There is no way.”

“All right, all right.” Jensen shrugs broadly in surrender. “But somebody. Didn’t you say there were other guy omegas in your family?”

Jared frowns. “Ugh, Lindy. I am _not_ talking to Lindy.” He scoots over to the couch and leans back against it. “I wish I could talk to someone who will never ever know who I am.”

“There’s always the internet,” Jensen says. “Or, hey, we’re pretty sure Sassy Ass is an omega, right? You could ask her.”

“Right,” Jared scoffed. “Dear Sassy Ass, I used to like girls, but then I primed, and now I like Matt Cohen. Send help.”

Jensen chuckles obligingly, but doesn’t fire back the retort Jared was expecting. The pause stretches out. The flow of the conversation is completely lost by the time Jensen quietly asks, “So you do?”

“Do what?” Jared tries to remember what he said.

“Like Matt. Like, seriously.”

“I keep telling you, I don’t know anything.”

Jensen nods, more to himself than Jared. “Right.”

It takes Jared a bit, but eventually he says, “Maybe?” When Jensen doesn’t say anything snide, Jared continues, “He seems like a decent guy, you know? And...” Jared’s flushing before the admission’s even made. “And he’s kind of hot.” 

“When he’s in sniffing distance, anyway,” Jensen says mildly.

“And, I don’t know. Apparently he’s still interested in _me_ , after I cussed him out for asking me to prom—”

“He asked you to prom?” Jensen asks, blinking. “And you cussed him out? Where the hell was I?”

“Uh, eating lunch.”

“Huh.”

“Anyway, I guess he knows what a spaz I am now, and he’s still interested, and that’s a good sign, right?”

“Of which? His taste or his intentions?”

“Shut up,” Jared says, and shoves Jensen into the arm of the couch. 

Once Jensen has shoved him back and equality is restored, Jensen’s smirk fades. “I’m serious about the second one,” he says.

Jared thinks back and snorts. “His _intentions_? Thanks, Dad.”

At that point the conversation devolves to insults and more shoving. Eventually it occurs to Jared that his parents probably want him to come home, and Jensen shows him to door. On the threshold, Jensen turns and looks at him with that same neutral, entomologist curiosity. “I still don’t get why,” he says. “Five years, man.”

Jared can’t find anything to say; he doesn’t know how to even begin to explain. He waits out Jensen’s stare. Finally Jensen shrugs. “See you later.”

It’s a dismissal. A little disheartened, Jared starts towards the sidewalk and home.


	4. Chapter 4

On one hand, Jensen is still talking to him. On the other hand, it feels like every single other aspect of Jared’s life is broken. Saturday is miserable. The whole, tangled mess with Trina and Matt sits like a mass in the pit of Jared’s stomach. Every time he so much as moves, he feels it. Eating makes him feel sick, so he mostly tries not to. 

His mom asks him what’s wrong, and he brushes her off. His dad sends him out with the hedge clippers, which improves the front shrubbery tons and doesn’t do diddly squat for Jared. Emily snipes and prods at him all day. He manages to ignore it until she tells him he’s being a bitch, her eyes lighting as she savors the illicit word, and he just about slaps her. Instead he goes back to bed.

His mom suggests things will be better once he gets back to school. He wonders what ‘things’ she thinks they are. It doesn’t matter; Monday isn’t going to make them better.

Saturday night, he’s hunched on his bed, ear buds in although as much attention as he’s paying them, they might as well be playing noise. The sun shone in earlier, but it’s dark now and he’s never gotten around to turning on a lamp. His door swings open, and he finds himself blinking against the hall light. He scents that it’s his mom even before his eyes adjust; this priming thing does have certain advantages, he’s found. She turns on his bedside lamp, closes the door behind her, and sits down on his bed.

“What?” he asks, his tone aiming for grumpy and, he suspects, falling pretty short.

“What’s going on, Jared?” She reaches out and squeezes his knee, like he’s still five. He shifts away from her.

“Nothing.”

“Don’t lie to me. I have a nose.” Off his look, she says, “Have you found out yet what fear smells like?”

“I... no?”

“It’s like body odor gone rancid. Not very pleasant. Jared, it’s oozing out of you.”

“Oh, God,” Jared says. He draws his knees up to his chin and hides his face against them.

“Let’s try this again. Sweetie, what’s going on?” Her hand lands on him again, his shoulder this time, and it doesn’t leave.

“Nothing,” he says again, but his voice breaks in the middle.

The dip in the mattress shifts, and now she’s next to him, rubbing circles on his back. She doesn’t say anything else. 

“I’m screwing everything up,” Jared says finally. The words get lost against his legs.

“What’s that?”

He lifts his head. “I’m screwing everything up,” he says again. With the words, the tears at the corners of his eyes break loose. “I hurt the girl I was going with—”

“The beta girl.”

“Yeah.”

She doesn’t say anything for while. She reaches over to fetch him a tissue from his night stand and waits patiently while he blows his nose in it, and then they just sit. Her fingers work the muscles in his neck. It hurts, because his neck is as tight as an industrial-strength spring, but after a while it hurts a little less.

Eventually, she says, “We can talk about it, if you want. You haven’t really told me how things have been going at school, or with your beta girl – Trina?”

“That’s over,” he says, words thick with snot and guilt. “But I can’t... I don’t want to talk about it. Okay?”

“Okay.” She clears his hair from his eyes. “You know I love you?”

He ducks his head. “Yeah, I know.”

“Okay. You want to talk, you know where I live.”

“Yeah.”

She leaves then, shutting the door gently behind her. 

What he wants is someone to talk to who has no idea who he is, who won’t compare him to their preconceived beta-Jared, who won’t _there there_ him, who’ll give him calm, impersonal advice in how to keep from screwing up his life. Even if it’s a little late for that.

It’s not until some time very early Sunday morning that he reconsiders Jensen’s off-hand suggestion. Jared laughed it off before. Now it looks like a lifeline. It only takes him the rest of the day to work up the courage to do anything about it. He spends all Sunday afternoon cleaning dead chrysanthemums out of the front flowerbeds and composing the email in his head.

_Dear Sassy Ass, I just had my first heat, and it’s ruining everything._

It’s possibly a really stupid idea. Possibly it’s just one more in a long line of really stupid ideas. He’s spent so much time not talking to real people, though, that he has no idea how to start now. Sassy Ass will have to do.

By Sunday night he has the email all typed up and scrubbed clean of any identifiers. He sends it from a sock account he only ever uses to sign up for coupons, and he addresses it to Sassy Ass’s Gmail, listed at the bottom of every weekly _Underground_ column.

\--

Monday Jared keeps his head down. Matt catches his eye in algebra class and nods in greeting. Jared freezes, trying to figure out how to acknowledge – whether to acknowledge at all – and takes so long to decide that Matt’s grin falters and he drops his eyes back to his homework, saving Jared from having to reach any kind of conclusion.

Jared can’t face the idea of the cafeteria, all full of smells and Doerflinger and Matt maybe wanting to talk to him and Trina definitely not, so he takes his home-packed sandwich and claims a concrete bench just outside the school entrance. The wind’s still brisk, even this late in April, but the sun is warm, and no one talks to him, which is about the best thing he can imagine.

At least, the best thing that he might actually be able to have.

He’s just tossed his empty sandwich bag into the garbage and is headed for his locker when a grip on his shoulder pulls him up short. He starts to turn, and Katie Cassidy swings into view. “Any chance this looks familiar?” she asks. She’s clutching a sheet of paper in one hand, some kind of printout from the look of it, and it flutters in the general direction of his face. 

Jared grabs hold of it still long enough to catch the first words. _I just had my first heat, and..._ His face burns hot; he should deny he’s ever seen the email before, should laugh, do _something_.

“I figured,” Katie says. 

“I...” Jared begins, but nothing follows.

Katie glances casually around, an operative checking for listening ears. “You able to stop by Mickey D’s after school?”

“Track practice,” Jared mumbles.

“After that, then.”

Can he? It wouldn’t be hard. He could call his mom from the office and let her know he’d be late. 

Does he want to?

Katie meets his gaze, steady and impassive. There’s no triumph there, no scorn or amusement. No pity, either.

“Okay.”

She nods. “See you then. Don’t wimp out on me.” She slaps him on the shoulder and turns to melt into the crowd, her printed email still in hand.

\--

At just after five, Jared finds Katie waiting in a shiny plastic booth at the back of McDonald’s. “I’m just gonna...” he says, gesturing towards the front counter, and she waves him off. Once he comes back, a cheeseburger on his tray (possibly with real cheese, who knows), he says, “So you’re Sassy Ass?”

He’s managed to work this out for himself, in the time between lunch and now.

Katie shrugs. “One of. We’re a conglomerate.” She eyes him narrowly. “Are you going to tell?”

“No,” he says. Telling would require explaining how he knew, and that isn’t an option. Speaking of which, “How’d you know? That it was from me?”

“I asked myself who’d be the angstiest new omega in school. A male omega who didn’t even know what he was until he primed? No contest.”

“I knew,” Jared mutters.

“Oh yeah?” Katie says, noncommittal. Noncommittal seems to be her primary mode. “News to the rest of us.”

“I didn’t tell anyone.”

“Huh.” Katie pokes doubtfully at her salad. “This is crap.” She reaches over and steals a handful of Jared’s fries. “S’what I get for trying the whole vegetable thing. Affronts to human decency.” 

Jared snorts, bemused, which must be her cue. 

“So life sucks, huh?”

“Um. Yeah.”

“Okay, first, realize that I?” She pokes a thumb towards her chest. “I am not a licensed professional. I am a concerned citizen with maybe a little experience. Grain of salt, etcetera, etcetera.”

“Okay,” Jared says, feeling a little uncertain again.

Katie slouches a little deeper and picks a fry from her stolen pile. “So tell me about it,” she says.

So Jared does.

It’s a haphazard narrative, full of backtracks and tangents as Katie probes lots of things he didn’t really mean to mention: how little he knew about heat before it hit him, how few people in his life knew what he’d prime into or that he’d prime at all. He expects a lot of dirty winks and demands for more detail about his heat, a lá Cousin Lindy, but she just watches him through all of it, munching on fries and making an encouraging noise now and then.

“So, you want to fuck Matt?”

“Um.” Jared feels himself turning red.

“Correction.” Katie’s still looking at him with what looks like purely professional interest. “You want him to fuck you?”

“Maybe,” he says, ducking his head. He knows she’ll know he means _yes_.

“And this girl Trina?”

“No,” he mutters. “Not anymore.”

“Hey,” Katie says. She reaches out and rubs his arm – like Trina, he thinks, and is freshly bitter at the memory.

“I want to!” he exclaims. “I mean, I want to want to. I just want to be normal.” He cringes; it sounds like such a little-kid thing to say. And yet, he doesn’t think he’s ever wanted anything as much as he’s wanted this.

“Jared.” It’s the gentlest word she’s said since he got here. He looks up, sees her eyes filling with more sympathy than he’d have thought Katie Cassidy was capable of. “You are normal. This is you being normal.”

“It sucks,” he says feebly.

He watches her take a deep breath, and he thinks, this is it. He’s spilled his guts, and Miz Sassy Ass is going to dole out his dollop of pithy wisdom and send him on his way. Maybe she’ll pat him on the head before he goes.

“So, I’m gynosexual,” Katie says.

Jared blinks. “Uh. What?”

“I like girls?”

“Oh,” Jared says intelligently. He’s missed something. “Right.”

Tori brought an alpha home from college once who called himself a gyno. He didn’t discriminate between primed and non, he said, omega women or beta; he liked them all equally. The explanation involved leering. Tori hit him with a pillow.

Katie continues, “Figured it out when I was, like, twelve. Started going with this girl at school when I was fourteen. Kept it pretty quiet. You know.”

Jared does. There are beta girls at school that claim the term. The locker room talk about them isn’t kind. It occurs to Jared that, technically, the word applies to him, too. Or it used to, anyway.”So...” he says.

“So then I primed.”

It takes him a moment, but he gets it eventually. “ _Oh_. So you... like with me.”

“Yeah.” She shrugs. “I go totally off girls, crush on this alpha that’s built like the Hulk.” Katie straightens her shoulders and angles her arms stiffly out, a mass of alpha muscle in parody. “I kiss my girlfriend and feel like I’m kissing my brother.” 

“What happened?”

Katie pauses. Jared steels himself for the bad news.

“I got over it. Kind of.”

“How?” Jared asks, and holds his breath.

She huffs. “It’s not so much a matter of how. Look, I broke up with my girlfriend, or she broke up with me. Whatever. It was a mutual break-up. Clearly this wasn’t working, and I was fifteen. Working through a relationship with that many hormones swimming through my stupid adolescent self wasn’t happening.”

That, Jared understands. Right down to the ‘stupid’ part. “What about...” He thinks maybe it’s a stupid question, but ever since Jensen brought it up he’s wondered. “What about girl alphas?”

Katie shrugs. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but they’re pretty thin on the ground. Like you. And, I dunno, I’ve never managed to hit it off with one. I’m not great at following, you know? And alphas are always wanting to lead.” 

Jared does know. Definitely the alphas he’s recently encountered haven’t lacked for initiative. Then again, recent history suggests he might be okay with that.

“Anyway,” Katie says pointedly, “I give it a couple of years. I fool around a little with an alpha or two, nothing serious. I angst a lot. Junior year, there’s this cute little beta who starts showing up at the Young Dems meetings. We sniff around each other a couple of months – figuratively, in her case – and I lay out all my cards, and she says she wants to give it a try.”

“And?”

Katie grins, huge and bright and smug. “Fourteen months on Thursday.”

“And it’s... good? It’s the same?”

Her eyes shift away. “It’s a hell of a lot better than when I first primed. I’m not gonna lie. An alpha can get my engine running like that.” Her fingers snap. “With Jem, I take a little more warming up.”

Jared contemplates the depth of experience implied by this comparison and tries desperately not to look like the blushing virgin he is. 

“But it’s not bad. There’s people you want to bang and people you want to spend your life with, and they’re not always the same. And I _like_ her, you know?”

He does. He knows exactly how that is. 

It just wasn’t enough, in his case.

“Anyway, like hell am I gonna let my body chemistry – not to mention every alpha who’s ever sniffed me up – change _me_.” Katie tongues under her lip thoughtfully. “So maybe there’s a little ‘Screw you, world’ going on in there, too.”

“So there’s hope,” Jared says. 

Katie sits up straight, blowing a hard breath through her nose. “Here’s the deal, Padalecki.” Jared hears the finality in her voice. He was right; here’s his dollop of wisdom, just a few minutes delayed. “Yeah, maybe you’ll swing back around. Sometimes it works that way. Your body’s still acclimating to all the new hormones, and after it adjusts, there’s a good chance ‘girl’ will nose ahead of ‘alpha’ in the attraction sweepstakes. It does for plenty of gyno omegas. But there’s no guarantee, okay? So then your choices are monkish celibacy or sex, romance, and the whole nine yards with someone who never quite lights your fire.” She shrugs. “Which, there are worse fates. _Or_ you can do the expected thing and hook up with some nice alpha that smells like your own private paradise.”

“Right.” Jared tries to see his solution, buried in all these options, and fails. “But what do I do now?”

Katie huffs a beleaguered sigh. “You wait, and you see how it turns out. Or you go pop your cherry with your alpha boy. Or you do any other damn thing you want. It’s your life.”

“Oh.” That wasn’t quite the help Jared was expecting. He wonders suddenly whether all of Sassy Ass’s petitioners are happy with their answers. 

“Why me?” he says suddenly. “I mean, why’d you haul me down here? Why not just answer me in the paper?”

“What, you wanted fame and fortune?” Katie’s eyes glint, amused.

“No, I just... do you have these one-on-ones with a lot of people?”

Katie drops her eyes. “Nah. You’re maybe the third one.”

“So...”

“I told you, your letter was a dead giveaway. Everyone would have known.” She smirks in his direction. “I spared you the embarrassment.”

“That’s all?” he says. “You could have sent me an email.”

“Because I feel you,” she says quietly. “The orientation shift – I get that. It’s freaking terrifying, on top of your basic new-omega crap. I wasn’t going to leave you hanging, no one to talk to.”

Jared is suddenly awkward in an overwhelming wash of gratitude. “Wow. Uh, thanks.” 

“Doesn’t have to be a one-time deal,” she says. “I can’t tell you what the hell to do. Like I even know what _I_ should do.”

 _Yes, you do,_ he wants to protest. _You get this all so much better than me. You’re not lost._

She continues, “But if you need an ear, some personal experience to compare to...” She shrugs. “Could be arranged.”

“I—”

She cuts off his exclamation of thanks. “Also, Thursdays, you should come grace the Omega Alliance meetings with your presence. Meet some of your fellow bitches.” She grins, and somehow in her mouth the word is something other than a slur. A badge of honor, maybe. “I mean it when I say ‘fellow’, too. You’re not the only o-boy in school, you know.”

Jared knows. He’s sniffed one now and again, a peculiar blend of _omega_ and the standard sweaty tang of adolescent male. So far, he’s ducked away every time he’s noticed one; deep down, he hated the blatant reminder of what he was, and anyway he figured allying himself with the knot slut tribe could only make things worse.

Maybe he made a mistake about that. 

“I’ll think about it,” he says.

“All I can ask.” Katie stretches, arms angles high over her head, and then she leans in to snatch his last fry. “Well,” she says, glancing meaningfully out the window at the low-hanging sun.

“Listen,” Jared says. He didn’t mean to talk about this. It’s not really Sassy Ass’s department, and he feels pathetic enough already. But now that he’s begun to let go a little of his low-grade, all-purpose panic, there’s one problem that looms over all the others, even the question of girl vs. alpha, Trina vs. Matt. “I have this friend. He’s kind of pissed at me.”

“About you being an omega?” Katie asks. “Screw him. That kind of friend, you don’t need.”

“No. At least... no. He’s a little weirded out, but that isn’t it. It’s just, he’s mad I didn’t tell him before. About me.” Jared’s embarrassed to admit this – whether for himself or for Jensen, he’s not sure.

Katie’s giving him that thoughtful gaze again. “You sorry about it? I’m talking legit regret, not just riding a guilt trip.”

“I... yeah.” By now, Jared’s at least confident of this: telling Jensen would have been all right. 

“So say so. If he’s really your friend, he’ll come around. And if there’s anything you haven’t been telling him about why, about your reasons, you might lead with that.”

“Okay, yeah. Yeah, that’d be good.”

“Great.” Katie slides out of the booth. “Now, I have absolutely filled my good deed quota for the day.”

“Thanks a lot,” Jared says, getting up, too. “Really.”

“No problem.” She hip checks him as she saunters past. Over her shoulder she calls, “Remember, Thursday!”

Jared watches her go and despairs of ever having even a tenth of the swagger she has.

\--

Tuesday, Jared has plans. He’ll catch Jensen’s eye in gym and ask if he can come over after school. They’ll sit in Jensen’s backyard. Jensen will fool around with the engine of the old motorcycle that used to belong to his Uncle Stan, and Jared will apologize again, and finally things will be right with the world - one of the most important parts of it, anyway.

What actually happens in gym is that before there’s even a chance to say hello to Jensen, Rogstad sidles up to next to Jared. 

The best and worst thing about Rogstad is that he’s beta. On one hand, this means he will never, ever be able to mickey Jared into anything. This is is good, because Jared suspects Rogstad would find that hilarious. One the other hand, Rogstad hasn’t spent the last sixteen years of his life getting _Don’t harrass the omegas_ tattooed on his brain, which Jared regrets. 

Jared gives Rogstad the stink-eye and take a step sideways. Rogstad follows: one step right. “So, gotten any knot lately?” This is not a new refrain from Rogstad. Jared ignores him.

Rogstad grins at him with something that’d be malice if Rogstad could focus the energy for it. “Bet you haven’t. Who’d want an omega as big as you?” When Jared doesn’t say anything, Rogstad reaches over and takes a swipe at Jared’s ass.

“Dude,” Jared says, and stumbles backwards. He almost runs into Cody Flannigan, who glances over incuriously. Jared schools his face into a neutral, nothing-to-see-here expression. From down the line Jared hears a snigger, and Jared fights down his flush.

Rogstad steps into his space again. “Have you even gotten fucked yet? Could totally fix that for you.” Before Jared can move away again, Rogstad’s gets a fumbling grip on Jared’s wrist. If Jared wants it gone, Jared’s going to have to make a scene.

Jared really doesn’t want to make a scene. “Dude, let _go_ ,” Jared says, trying to keep his voice down. A couple of heads turn in their direction. Smirking, Rogstad lets go and steps away. Jared fumes silently. 

From Jared’s other side, Jensen says, “You okay?” The last Jared had seen, Jensen was on the other side of the gym.

Jared hunches his shoulders in. “I’m fine.”

“If he’s giving you crap, I’m gonna give it right back.”

It’s unaccountable. Jared woke up this morning planning to _apologize_ to Jensen. Instead he says, “Dude, enough with the protective pseudo-alpha bullshit! I can take care of myself.”

Jensen scowls. “Fine.” He moves a few feet away from Jared.

Well, so much for the plan, probably. Jared’ll have to work up his courage and try to make peace with Jensen another day.

Rogstad ends up on Jared’s team, which is unfortunate; Jared would much rather Rogstad was throwing a ball at him from across the line than be anywhere in proximity. Jensen’s on the other team, and also Trina’s friend Vicky, who’s been giving Jared the hairy eyeball for days. Jared’s not looking forward to either of them aiming things his way.

The thing is, Jared likes dodgeball, and it’s a rare day in between more organized sports that Mr. Spinoza lets them play it. Jared’s not too bad at it, either. Two minutes in, he catches a ball Jensen threw at someone else and triumphantly points Jensen towards the sidelines before he even thinks about it. There’s a stutter in Jensen’s step, and then he shakes his head and grins a little, and Jared thinks, maybe this will be okay after all.

As people get weeded out on each side, the action gets more aggressive. Vicky’s still in, and Jared’s starting to get the feeling that she’s gunning for him. He’s keeping an eye on her, which is why he barely sees the ball zinging towards him from the other corner of the court. He twists, off-balance but hands up, and he thinks he has a chance to catch it before it hits him.

Which is exactly when something slams into his side and knocks him down onto the court.

“Hey, Padalecki. Saved you from the ball.” Rogstad sounds ridiculously pleased with himself. He’s sprawled on top of Jared, heavy and too warm. “How you gonna thank me?” His hand’s already straying. This is new, Rogstad’s never slid his hand up the inside of Jared’s thigh before. 

Distantly, Jared hears a whistle. Ten seconds and Mr. Spinoza will over here, Rogstad will be off him innocent as you please, and it’ll be just another day. 

Rogstad has to have heard the whistle, too; he knows his time’s up. He starts to slide off Jared. “Whaddya say, o-boy? A knot slut like you, I bet you take it from _anybody_.” He cackles, his hand pawing across Jared’s ass again.

It’s not the first time Jared’s had the term ‘knot slut’ applied to him right out loud, although the last time was a lot of years ago. He always knew it was only a matter of time until he heard it again. Quietly, calmly, in the most rational part of his mind, Jared decides he does not care if he makes a scene. 

He has an elbow free. He twists under Rogstad to get some maneuvering room, and he drives the elbow into Rogstad’s ribs.

“Fuck!” Rogstad yells. He rolls off of Jared, one hand clapped to his side. He’s staring like he’s never seen Jared before. “What the hell was that?” Jared can’t tell if the puzzlement is an act or not. He’s not sure which would piss him off more.

Jared pushes himself upright, leaning back on shaking arms. Slowly he gets to his feet. Suddenly Jensen’s next to him, ready to catch him if he does something embarrassing, like fall over. Goddamn would-be alpha; Jared kind of wants to tell Jensen to leave him _alone_. But Jared’s not going to fall over, and he’s got more immediate concerns than Jensen. He stares back at Rogstad for a moment and tries to get his breath under control. Somehow, standing upright is taking a lot of oxygen. Finally, deliberately, Jared says, “Keep your fucking hands off me. Asshole.”

Rogstad’s a brawler when he feels like it. Mostly he’s too lazy to bother. Get him drunk or just pissed off, though, and he’s brutal. Jared would have bet Rogstad wasn’t stupid enough to start something in the middle of gym class – Rogstad taking swings would only get Spinoza here faster – but then Jared wasn’t expecting Rogstad to knock him sprawling across the hardwood, either.

Right now, Jared gives it even odds of Rogstad walking away or laying him out flat. He waits. At his elbow, he feels more than sees the violence Jensen is barely keeping in check. The moment stretches out. It feels endless.

It’s Jensen who breaks the moment. “You heard him,” he says. “Leave him the fuck alone.” 

“Whatever,” Rogstad says, rolling his eyes and his shoulders. Jared takes a breath of relief.

Spinoza arrives on the scene about then. He asks what happened, and of course Rogstad says something about an accident and goddamned flaky omega freaks. Jared shrugs. Spinoza looks them both over ever so carefully, and then he says, “You know we have a zero-tolerance omega harassment policy in this school, Mr. Rogstad?”

Rogstad’s eyes go wide. Jared wants to melt into the floor.

“But I’m beta!” Rogstad yelps.

“Hmm. How about you go down to the office and let them remind you how those guidelines go.” Spinoza’s already writing a memo on the pad he keeps in his back pocket. He hands it to Rogstad, and Rogstad goes, grumbling under his breath. Spinoza turns to Jared. Jared stands up as straight as he’s able, which is pretty straight; he’s not shaking too badly anymore. “Jared, Jensen, why don’t you two call it a day and hit the showers.”

“No, it’s okay, I want to play—”

Mr. Spinoza points, and Jared reluctantly goes. Jensen trails behind. 

Jensen doesn’t say anything to Jared, doesn’t ask him if he’s okay or what happened. Jared’s grateful for that. Jensen doesn’t make any comment, either, when Jared stands in the shower for a really long time.

The spray isn’t as strong as Jared would like, which is maybe why he doesn’t feel much less grimy than before. Less sweaty, yes; less gross, not so much. He swears he can still smell Rogstad’s breath on him. He can feel it soaking into the pores of his skin.

There’s a part of him that knows what’s going on here. He read the sexual harassment chapter in the book, after all. He guesses this is what feeling violated feels like, at least on a pretty small scale. The knowledge doesn’t do a lot for the persistent feeling of Rogstad’s hands on his skin.

A guy can’t stand under a dribble of water forever, though; class will be over soon enough, and people will start filtering in. Jared gets out and towels off. He sits on the bench next to Jensen to put on his shoes. Jensen’s still quiet. He’s giving Jared space – and yes, Jared’s aware enough to recognize that that’s exactly what Jensen’s doing, treating the fragile omega with a little extra care.

“ _This_ is why I didn’t want to be an omega,” Jared blurts out. “Because it means I’m the one who has to sit around and get rescued.”

Jensen squints at him. “Dude, what? I don’t rescue you.”

“What was that out there?” Jared flings a hand towards the locker room door. “You were gonna deck Rogstad if he didn’t back down.”

“Yeah?” Jensen blinks at him a couple of times. “Jared, I don’t rescue you,” he says patiently. Jared can tell he’s being patient, because Jensen is using his _be nice to the morons_ voice. He scoots a few inches closer on the bench and knocks shoulders with Jared. “Dude, that’s _backup_. You know, like people do? ‘I got your back?’”

“...Really?”

Jensen doesn’t roll his eyes. Jared suspects that shows a lot of restraint on his part. “Really.”

Jared tries to let that sink in. It doesn’t so much sink in as slide right off. “But this always happens to me!”

“What are you even talking about, man? Have you been getting into brawls and not telling me? ‘Cause I call that rude.”

Suddenly Jared realizes just what it is that’s been bugging him, and he snaps his mouth shut.

“Jared, what?” Jensen leans over so he can peer up into Jared’s face. “What is it?”

“Um.” Okay, he’s going to talk about this. This is good, right? Clearing the air and getting it all out there? Anyway, at least Jensen will know why Jared’s been holding out on him all this time. “There was a thing. At my old school. Before we moved.”

“A thing,” Jensen says. He doesn’t say anything else. He doesn’t push; he waits.

Jared laughs. There is nothing funny about this, even now. “A whole year of things, actually. Fourth grade, I started getting a lot of crap from the other kids.”

“Oh?”

“You know, boy omega, Texas.” 

Jensen doesn’t know, Jared realizes, not really; his mom’s from Texas, but she moved up here before Jensen was born, and Jensen’s only visited the state a couple of times. Besides, it might not be the _whole_ state. Maybe it’s just Jared tiny, awful corner of it.

Jared clarifies, “‘Bitch boy’ is one of the politer terms, where I came from.”

“Oh.”

“And it, um, it got pretty bad. There was a... thing.” Jared grimaces over the word, but he isn’t going to think about this long enough to come up with a better one. “With me and some fifth graders. And another kid.” Jared isn’t going to tell Jensen about Tay Amundson, the smallest boy in their class and pre-omega besides. He isn’t going to tell Jensen what names Jared called Tay because the fifth graders told him to or how Jared kicked Tay square in the junk because he knew otherwise they’d be kicking him instead.

From the look on Jensen’s face, Jared thinks maybe details are unnecessary anyway.

Jared blows his breath out and says, “So, um, that’s part of the reason we moved. I mean, also my dad’s work, but... Anyway, when I got here, I didn’t tell anyone. Not just you,” he adds, because this point is important. “My parents said it’d be better here, but I, uh, didn’t really believe them. So when people asked, I said I was beta.”

“Shit.” 

Jared dares a glance at Jensen. He looks sick.

“Anyway, I’m sorry I never told you,” Jared says. “I got used to not telling anyone, and then later, by the time we were hanging out a lot, it would have been awkward. And, um.” Jared takes another careful breath. “And I didn’t want you to know how weird I was.”

Jensen laughs shakily. “I keep telling you, man. I already knew you were weird.” 

“Ass,” Jared says reflexively.

“You know it.” Jensen smirks. 

Jared doesn’t respond. His brain is stuck on Jensen and being weird and being weird together _with Jensen_. He sits, and he thinks about that for a long time, a minute or two at least, until Jensen waves his hand in Jared’s face. “Yeah,” Jared says, blinking.

“We okay?” Jensen asks.

Jared thinks a little bit more, and then he starts to grin. “Yeah. Yeah, I think we are.”

\--

It’s Wednesday. Tomorrow Jared might show his face at Katie’s meeting of _Omegas Plus Allies_ , which is what it says on the little card she gave him, recently rescued from a pile of junk on the top of his dresser. Or, he might not show. He has options.

Today, though, is the day of the _Underground_ and potato wedges. Jared nabbed a paper from a stack inside the boys’ locker room, and on his tray are piled his potato wedges, salty and greasy and very nearly nutrition-free.

Without giving it too much thought, he lingers near the end of the lunch line until Matt Cohen comes through. When Matt gets to him, Jared grins and waves Hi like the enormous dork he is. It’s not like his flirtation technique has somehow improved with new hormones.

After a startled pause, though, Matt grins back. 

That was all Jared wanted. He nods goodbye and heads over to his table. Everyone’s already there, Brody and Travis arguing over some algebra detail, Doerflinger applying himself to his potato wedges with a single-mindedness that his teachers would despair over, Jensen just sitting. Waiting, Jared knows, because he recognizes Jensen’s waiting shoulders.

Jared didn’t really plan this, but now that he’s here, it’s obvious. After he sets his tray on the table, he drops into his seat and slides the _Underground_ to Doerflinger. “So,” he says, drawing out the syllable until all eyes are on him. “So I’m an omega, and I go knot-hot a couple of times a year, and I maybe like alphas. Anyone have a problem with that?”

There’s a mumbled consensus, a group shrug. Travis won’t meet his eyes, and maybe that’s going to be a problem, but just this minute Jared doesn’t care. Doerflinger, he can tell, is gearing up with questions, but the guy is basically malice free, so Jared will take what he can get. To Jared’s left, Jensen’s smirking at his salad.

“Cool,” Jared says. “So Doerflinger, what’s Sassy Ass say this week?”

Doerflinger picks up the paper, clears his throat, and starts to read.

[end]


End file.
